Grey leather in W210 has lost some colour in places

[Charles Morgan]

See below - just colour loss rather than real wear on the leather, and I'd like to do some touching up. Does anybody have suggestions about restoring the colour effectively (and reasonably)?

 

[davidjpowell]

 

[davidjpowell]

Or gliptone Leather Recolouring

 

[Charles Morgan]

Thanks David - I have ordered the Gliptone kit as I couldn't find a felt tip pen of the correct Orion Gray shade.

 

[DSM10000]

I have recoloured black leather seats and did find it tricky to get an even sheen With practice I made a reasonable job of it but that light grey may well be rather more tricky to blend. I would think that you may need to cover the whole panel to get an acceptable result.

Have you thought of finding a vehicle re-trimmer? Often a good place to find someone are the advertisements in the classic car magazines.

A friend had the seats seat restored / re-coloured on TR4, it was rather grubby and faded although the leather was intact, from memory that was circa £250 for all seats and the result was outstanding.

Like most restorations the end result is only as good as the preparation. If the colour is significantly faded / scuffed you may need to add the colour in stages with it diluted initially until you build up a base layer that may then be covered with the final coating that will then hopefully blend in with the original.

Good luck.

 

[High-Lo]

Hi Charles,

Dynamix dyes are also good and sell on eBay. I have the grey leather and ordered the Orion Grey too but when it came, I found it was a shade too dark. It turns out that my steering wheel and upper part of the dash trim is Orion Grey and the rest of the interior like the lower part of the dash and the seats were actually Alpaca Grey. I reordered and it was a perfect match.

I've used their colours 3 times now in 3 different cars and it does work well.

Good luck,
Steve

 

[bolide]

You'll really struggle to get a good result on that type of mark using any kind of paint or dye. I use a leather polish with some dye in - just apply it with a cloth, rub it in in the affected areas, and polish off. Works brilliantly, particularly on black

I bought mine off eBay for about £12 - can't recall the name, though

Nick Froome

 

[ss201]

Thanks David - I have ordered the Gliptone kit as I couldn't find a felt tip pen of the correct Orion Gray shade.

I hope you have more luck with Orion Grey than I did with Gliptone. Ordered the kit, using the correct interior code for Orion Grey from my car's data card, which corresponded with the same number for Orion Grey on the list of Mercedes leather colours listed on their website. When it arrived the colour was a mile out - far lighter than my seats. I phoned Gliptone, explained the colour mismatch - only to be told, "There are two Orion Greys - your car must have the darker Orion Grey. I should know, Orion Grey is one of our most popular colours".

Er - if that's the case - how come you don't state that on the colour chart on your website then? Must be my fault, I suppose.

Bloody pompous idiots is how I would describe the Gliptone experience.

 

[Dieselman]

Try Furniture Clinic, they are pretty good and the owner is really genuine.

I've seen some seats they did and they were very good.

 

[Charles Morgan]

Well, the Gliptone turned up today and the colour match is perfect. I can see why getting an even result is going to be fun, but simply cleaning and conditioning the leather has taken some of the wear pattern away. I shall have a crack at dyeing the smaller parts tomorrow when the conditioner has dried out.

 

[Dieselman]

Is it wear or stains?

 

[Charles Morgan]

Mostly wear to the dye rather than the leather, so where the dye is thinner, the dirt shows more clearly. A couple of patches on the driver's seat right hand bolster are worn more, but not badly.

I think a few layers of dye will pretty much do it.

 

[Charles Morgan]

After one coat last night and another one this morning, front passenger seat looking a lot better:

Blending in is the biggest challenge, but a light coat around the areas needing the most dye seems to work well.

Another 2 applications and I think it will be pretty much imperceptible - if you look now without knowing what was there before it is pretty hard to notice.

 

[nigel cross]

When the dyeing stage is complete, do you have to seal it in some way?

 

[Charles Morgan]

No - it is essentially dye and seal in the same solution. You do have some gloss finish that can be put on but only to match in to the surrounding areas.

 

[Charles Morgan]

All done - I think there is a limit to how many layers as the worn areas lack the texture of the rest of the leather, so the patch shows differently as a result of that textural difference. I am very pleased at how easily it has blended in and all worn areas now look the right colour.

 

[Charles Morgan]

Before and after

Driver's seat bolster -

Rear seat cushion

Passenger front seat cushion

This has the gloss finish on - just enough to give it a slight sheen to match the rest of the leather. A couple of bits of tidying up to do at the seams, but pretty pleasing.

 

[DSM10000]

A job well done Charles. It seems to match the rest of the leather colouring very well.

 

[Charles Morgan]

So much so that as I popped to the cashpoint an hour or so ago, someone stopped his van and asked me if I was selling it.

An odd way of searching for cars.