Driver's seat piping frayed...

[BigCatXJS]

Hi All,
The piping on my seat has started to fray/split on one side. This has been caused by general wear and tear as I cannot help but brush past this each time I get in and out the car; I don't consider myself to be excessively fat, just rather tall...

There are two affected areas; both approximately 1" in length. Recent enquiries have revealed that a hole or tear anywhere else on the leather apart from the piping would be easy to fix. To replace the piping would involve a complete re-uphostering of the entire seat. Given that the rest of the seat is in really good condition, this seems excessive.

Does anyone have any ideas on how I can fix this issue? Tiny slithers of sellotape would just spoil the look of the interior...

Thanks, Rich.

[Linxman]

Hi Rich
I would agree that it probably won't be easy to do a proper repair job that will look good and stand the test of time - but I'll wait to see if anyone has any good ideas.

However, I don't see why the whole seat would need to be reupholstered. The piping is only sewn in between the two adjoining leather pieces, so why couldn't you remove the cover, undo the stitches and then ask a trim shop to reassemble using new pieces of matching piping? Ok, so they can't charge as much but you get to keep your original seats. Any reason why this can't be done?
Cheers

[kelsham]

Hi I had a seat in one car I owned which had obviously had the piping replaced. The person who had carried out the repair had not removed all the piping but had replaced only one section.
I spotted the overlap.
They had probably removed some of the stitching and put new material over the piping cord.
regards Kels

[BigCatXJS]

Thanks for the ideas and suggestions. I've laid-up the Big Cat for the next few months (fed-up with cleaning the salt and grim off all the time!), so I have some time to think and source some bits.

Many thanks, Rich.