Dealmonger: A Leather and Vinyl Repair Kit For $13
By Stephen Cooke
Amazon’s offering this leather and vinyl repair kit for $12.70. It ships with a few different colors you can mix to perfectly match your vehicle and the manufacturer claims it works on all vinyl and leather-covered areas such as dashboards, seats, and even furniture at home.
Actually, I ripped the leather seat in my truck so I’m looking for a cheap repair. This might be it!
Via Amazon
Street Pricing [Google Product Search]
May 2nd, 2007 at 10:25 am
Good luck with this. I’ve tried these mending kits overe and over (including some “pro” ones from industrial car detailing places) and can never seem to get a good color match or bond. Last time I needed a leather repair on my leather Volvo seats, I took it to an professional. Worth the 50 bucks.
Oh, and it always seems that the tear is in a wear spot, and the repair has no tensile strength. It just ends up tearihng again.
You may have better luck (or have better skillz) than me. But that’s my $.02.
Steve
May 3rd, 2007 at 2:24 pm
Steve: I used a kit like this to repair a cracked dash in my old 280Z many years ago. It was tough learning to match the “grain” pattern in the plastic, and the repair wasn’t perfect, but at the time it was all I could afford.
August 18th, 2008 at 4:23 pm
These kind of kits can produce decent results if every step of the process is done correctly, but can’t come near the results of a professional who does it every day. I have been doing professional vinyl repair since the early 1990’s and have seen some leather repair professionals do some work that was nearly impossible to detect. Its hard to beat professional level craftsmen who do it all day long working with professional grade materials. As far as using it for vinyl repair, the heat-welding method that’s been used for the last 30+ years seems to outlast everything else in durability tests. I agree with Steve, a professional is usually worth the time and expense, but I still like to tinker first on my own with most things, if nothing else to learn how its done.