Leather vs cloth vs ?

Chuppa · Postby **Chuppa** » Tue Jun 08, 2010 8:54 am

Interested to get people's take on the 5's seats. Leather, cloth, lambswool etc, what's your preference and why.

Cheers,

Chuppa

jules · Postby **jules** » Tue Jun 08, 2010 10:39 am

Leather mmmmmmmmm smeelllll.....

Jules

bigdog · Postby **bigdog** » Tue Jun 08, 2010 11:53 am

Leather is great for look and smell, but slippery in corners. I sold off my leather seats and bought cloth ones and am much happier and more comfortable in the car. They are also much easier to sit on on hot days when the car has been out in the sun... leather = burnies! :frown:

broady · Postby **broady** » Tue Jun 08, 2010 11:57 am

Cloth.

Luke · Postby **Luke** » Tue Jun 08, 2010 12:01 pm

The Leather SE seats are nice and comfy, but are more slippery then the slip and slide, on trackdays.
Look shiny and nice to.

Hence why I have a Sparco Sprint V on seperate rails for track days.
Pain in the arse to get in and out of, but thats what you want for the track.

If I had to pick for the road between Leather or Cloth standard seats, I'd take the leather.

sliq · Postby **sliq** » Tue Jun 08, 2010 1:59 pm

i got the leather with mesh (stock nb8b seats). comfy but when the mesh starts to tear away it looks pretty fugly. not to mention a pita to clean with some stains.

Hammer · Postby **Hammer** » Tue Jun 08, 2010 2:21 pm

Leather seats all the way, unless you plan to track it.

Mr Morlock · Postby **Mr Morlock** » Tue Jun 08, 2010 3:31 pm

leather looks good but in many ways it is inferior to cloth though I expect Benny will jump on me for that view. Leather seats in many cars apply only to facings and the quality of the leather is suspect anyway. I recently compared back to back leather 6 years old in a Ford SUV and cloth in a Mazda SUV of the same vintage and the cloth was more comfortable- leather can tend to harden or it may be less supple than cloth even as first fitted. Cloth is cooler on a hot day and warmer on a cold one. Leather if often slippery.Cheap cloth seats may not be particularly comfortable or attractive.

Leather may outlast cloth but it cost more to replace and it may be of academic interest anyway.. not many owners keep cars long enough for it to be an issue. Restorers spend many thousands to put leather in old cars and then rarely use the vehicles.

Lambswool if properly fitted is a very comfortable product but it does not look right in all cars though a careful choice of colour helps. I think a short nap might be necessary for the 5 to avoid raising the seating position.

zombie · Postby **zombie** » Wed Jun 09, 2010 12:17 am

My current and previous MX-5 both had it right :mrgreen:

Leather seats with Alcantara inserts - Alcantara being much more comfortable to sit on than leather, and don't get hot in summer - and no sliding around on them

Chuppa · Postby **Chuppa** » Wed Jun 09, 2010 12:35 am

How did the alcantera hold up in your previous 5 Zombie? It's a type of high-class suede isn't it? Recent pics I've seen of 10AEs don't seem to show much wear on the blue stuff, maybe it wears better than the bog-standard cloth.

Chuppa

sliq · Postby **sliq** » Wed Jun 09, 2010 12:37 am

alcantara?! *faints

zombie · Postby **zombie** » Wed Jun 09, 2010 12:50 am

Chuppa wrote:How did the alcantera hold up in your previous 5 Zombie? It's a type of high-class suede isn't it? Recent pics I've seen of 10AEs don't seem to show much wear on the blue stuff, maybe it wears better than the bog-standard cloth.

It's a synthetic alternative to suede - some more info at wikipedia

I think it held up pretty well, considering the age (10 years) - the seats had stains in them when I got the car (as you can see on the passenger seat in the above pic) but no "wear marks" as such - as opposed to for example the black & blue leather-wrapped steering wheel which was badly faded - and ditto with the gear knob, where you could barely read the shift pattern.

Randy · Postby **Randy** » Wed Jun 09, 2010 10:18 am

Cloth.

Benny · Postby **Benny** » Wed Jun 09, 2010 2:45 pm

A Mr Morlock says, the leather used in most cars is very tough, but from a leatherman's view, it's not so good.

By and large, car upholstery leather is heavily corrected or snuffed.
This is where the tannery actually sands back the grain of the leather to reduce the number of visible scars and other imperfections.
Then, they applly copious amounts of binders (like glue) to fill in the grain that they sanded off earlier, then spray lot of pigments on the surface so it will repel stains and toughen up the surface against abrahsion.
So, you are actually NOT sitting onfleather, but you are sitting on pigments, which is why leather seats feel cold.

Good leather feels warm to touch, but a really good, naked leather would wear easily and also stain easily as it is dyed, not pigmented, and would also cost considerably more.

Mr Morlock is also correct in saying that it is usually only the facings that are leather and the sides and back of the seats is usually a matching vinyl - even in Mercedes ad BMW's, and this is done to save costs as a normal upholstery leather used by car companies would cost them around $4.00 per square foot and the vinyl around 50 cents a square foot.