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By Mark M
#11877
My first post in this section. It's to do with upholstery BUT not re-covering anything...Yet.
I got these seats and door panels a couple of months back from a 1971 Plymouth Valiant that had sat in a collapsed garage since 1974. Car only had 13k miles on it. The car was a basketcase as mother nature and the metal termites did their thing. However, the mice and weather elements had left the seats alone. I have some before and after pics. The shiny pics look makes them look wet after but in fact they are dry. I will be re-covering them with my own design BUT at least this way, you know after the cleaning if you want to or not as you have taken the years of dirt out of the equation.

Cleaning procedure.
Vacuum loose dirt
Get Goop hand cleaner by the handful and slather it on the seats into every nook and cranny
Let sit for 15-20 mins
Add just one spray mist of water - less the better
Work area with soft nail brush
Let sit another 15-20 mins
Wash off with garden hose thoroughly
Wipe excess water off
Let dry until next day
Apply mineral oil generously to re-hydrate the vinyl - repeat next day
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John, cate.bolt liked this
By Mark M
#11881
@vicstric - sometimes you just have to think outside the box. If that handcleaner is good enough for my hands and removes everything but skin, then it's good enough for the seats.
vicstric liked this
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By John
#11890
Wow! that is awesome! They look brand new. Thanks for sharing your process. What made you decide to use Goop hand cleaner??
Mark M liked this
By Mark M
#11898
@John Thank you. They look even better in person. I will recover them but I wanted to see if I even needed to. Reason for GOOP OR GOJO is that it contains lanolin, which is good for the skin. And as our skin and vinyl have oils within them, it just made sense to use it as the product doesn't contain any chemical solvents such as naphtha, kerosene, ammonia etc, which we wouldn't put on our own skin anyways. The process is messy as the goop and dirt wants to stick to the soft brush (shake it off outside) but the results speak for themselves.

I guess you can use this for boat seats as they are use to water splashing on them. The cleaning process didn't take very long so if a boat owner was to do this once a year, imagine how clean their seats would be. But then again, that would leave less and less customers for the upholstery business LOL

One word of warning, do not use this process on leather as leather will react way different and could damage the material.
Michelle_Trillium, John liked this

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