8/13/03
Upholstery XVII: Rear Seat Cushions

I started today without a real plan on how I was going to rebuild my rear seat cushions. After feeling the difference between the Latex Foam, and the Urethane Foam, I really wanted to use the latex foam for the seat cushions. Even though I would probably never sit in the back seat, I still wanted to replicate the plush soft feel of the original seats.

The first step was to remove the old cushion from the seat pan. The pan is made out of aluminum, and the cushion was glued in place. The rear seat cushion were pretty badly dry rotted throughout, unlike the some of the sections of the seat back that I was able to save where the surface was fine.

I took a pneumatic sander and took off most of the leftover foam, and glue from the seat pan to give a nice clean surface to apply new glue.

I took down the remainder of the latex foam mattress that I used for the front cushions, and started cutting out foam to fit inside the seat pan. It took me couple of tries to figure out how to get the right contour of the foam across the front edge, but I finally got something that will work. I used the other seat cushion as a guide for the thickness  and shape of the cushion. The ridges are from the mattress surface, and will be sanded away. You can see that some of the sanding had already begun in the center of the seat. I used a coarse pad, and a light touch to shape the foam to my liking. This process was much easier than the front cushions because the foam is anchored to the seat pan so it doesn’t go flying across the room when the sanding pad catches the material!

By the end of the day, I had one pretty complete rear seat cushion. I will wrap this cushion with a thin layer of foam to add some smoothness to the surface, and it will be ready to be covered in leather. I hope the next cushion will come together much easier and faster because now I have a plan!

Tomorrow I will be leaving at the crack of dawn for Monterey California to join the hoards of car enthusiasts to attend the Concorso Italiano, Monterey Historic Races, and the Pebble Beach Concours D’elegance. I hope to meet some Ferrari owners, and fans of this site at some of these events. I’m hosting a small get together Thursday night, 8pm, at my motel, and if you’re in the area, stop by!

Best Western
Park Crest Motel
1100 Munras Avenue, Monterey, California
831-372-4576

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