I did the paint correction and ceramic coating on this M3 last Fall and the owner asked me to refresh the interior to match. This is perhaps the cleanest E36M3 I’ve ever seen so I was glad to have the opportunity to get the interior to a condition that matched the paint.
BMW leather generally holds up very well and this car is no exception. Besides the wear to the side bolsters from sliding in and out of the seats, you tend to see damage from skin oils and a lack of leather conditioner. Both result in cracking, but the cracks associated with the oil stains also tend to curl up and are much harder to repair. You tend to see this on arm rests and on the Vader seats lower portion of the headrests — or Goofy ears. This wasn’t the first time this interior has been refreshed. The previous coatings held up well for the most part and really only failed on the door panels.
I started by steam cleaning the door panels and seats. I liberally applied Lather interior cleaner, applied steam, and wiped off with a microfiber towel. For the panels where the dye was worn away completely or the cracks were very deep, I also sanded the leather, cleaned with ColourLock Mild Leather Cleaner and then applied Liquid leather with a spatula. If you take your time with the spatula to remove any excess material, you can really reduce the amount of sanding you need to do when it dries.
Once it dried I began applying the leather dye using a sponge and set it with heat. The dye I’m using on this car came from SeatDoctors.com. They make VIN color-matched dye that’s very user friendly to apply. The areas with the most damage like the side-bolsters required six or more applications, but most of the areas only required two or three. Work one area at a time and let each area cool before adding the next layer. You can use a heat gun or hair dryer to set the dye, just don’t overheat the surface or it will bubble and you’ll have to sand it down and start over. I let the seats cure for 48 hours before adding conditioner before sitting in them. Because the dye is water based, you have a fairly large window of time that you can clean up any spills or cross contamination on panels that are a different color.
I think these seats look great and the customer was very happy with the results.
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