Seat Cleaner

[sudsmobile]

Couldn't be less true. Magic Eraser is abrasive, which is great sometimes. Magic Eraser also doesn't work great if there's grain. We all have our own techniques that we prefer, but this is just plain off the reservation IMO.

[Eldorado2k]

Couldn't be less true. Magic Eraser is abrasive, which is great sometimes. Magic Eraser also doesn't work great if there's grain. We all have our own techniques that we prefer, but this is just plain off the reservation IMO.

I would never use either on leather seats. On vinyl door panels I’d pick the Magic Eraser over the brush everytime. It conforms to the shape of the panel, works wet instead of dry, it can be rinsed, IMO it beats it in every way and feels less aggressive to top it off.

[sudsmobile]

Yeah, I don't like the brush on anything too contoured or firm. As far as feeling "less aggressive", that's exactly what it is. Your feeling. Because it's not. Magic Eraser is not magic. It's melamine foam. Melamine foam is an extremely fine sandpaper.

[Eldorado2k]

Yeah, I don't like the brush on anything too contoured or firm. As far as feeling "less aggressive", that's exactly what it is. Your feeling. Because it's not. Magic Eraser is not magic. It's melamine foam. Melamine foam is an extremely fine sandpaper.

Nothing wrong with extremely fine sandpaper. On the other hand, that brush feels like 3000 grit, and it doesn’t seem to soften up much when you spray cleaner on it.

[Coach Steve]

When the seats are dirty enough that they require using a brush vs just wiping them down, I have a couple of Kiwi boot and shoe horse hair brushes. They're stiff enough to get after the dirt but soft enough that they could never scratch or leave any kind of mark on even the finest, most delicate leather. Made by the Kiwi Shoe Polish co.

[WRAPT C5Z06]

YouTube

Sent from my LG-H932 using Autogeekonline mobile app

[oneheadlite]

This’ll sound crazy, but I had really good luck on some nasty E36 M3 convertible seats using a strap of the loop side of Velcro. (1-1.5” wide, 5” long or so)

No idea where I got it, but after trying the few things I had on hand at the time with no luck, I thought - what the heck. Soaked it in Griot’s interior cleaner, sprayed the seat down, and went to town. Requiring no more scrubbing that the YouTube link above, the seats came back remarkably well.

Probably not something you’d use every time, but maybe something to have around if nothing else is working well. I’ve also got a deck staining pad that I swear looks just like the face of the interior brush. Been curious to try it and see how it works.

[Mad Wax]

I too am looking for a dedicated leather cleaner that's strong, but safe. APC's and degreasers are just too harsh on old, cracking leather, and they will especially harm perforated leather if it's old. McKees 70/30 so far worked the best for me. The Megs leather cleaner, and CG leather cleaner are just too weak if the dirt is embedded deep into the grain. That yellow "mouse" scrubber brush I found works excellent on leather, and is very safe on cracked and sensitive areas. I can scrub over cracked areas and it won't make it worse. I'd use the magic eraser only as a last resort on leather...but works great on plastics.

[reglus03]

I work in the detail shop doing interior and exterior work. I'm talking about cleaning interior to the finest even with heavy stains from drink spills you name it. But as far as leather goes, I use dissolve-all from blue coral.

1.Pre-treat the area you are going to clean. Usually I don't let it sit long since it's leather (no more than 30 second)
2. Agitate the surface or area. Use a small tooth brush if need to get in smaller crevices.
3. Grab towel and wipe off.
Do step 1 and 2 if needed again but usually 2 times is good enough. Then use your leather cream.

Dissolve all usually do the trick. But let's say the leather is just so dirty and you can pretty much see dirt, I like to go with the stronger route using duragloss diluted 1:1
Spray area with duragloss and work on it right away. When I'm lazy, I use 3M scotch pad. They have several different scotch color but I use the brown one since it's not as abrasive as the rest.
Putting too much pressure will discolor the leather. I usually do about medium pressure. Not too hard or too light pressure. Wipe and walahhhhh! But again let's say if you dont have the 3m scotch, you can use the hard brush again.
The pad is just to get the work done fast

Btw we don't use CM product, they're garbage. Sorry if it offends anyone.

[Calendyr]

If the seats are really hammered, you might have to go to much more powerful products.

Let me give you an example. 2 weeks ago I did a deluxe interior cleaning for a client. This is my highest package where I spend about 5 to 6 hours just on the interior. His car was a 2006 Volkswagen Passat and his beige leather seats had never been cleaned.

I always start with a 10:1 Meguiar's APC+ cleaning using a soft brush on dual action polisher. After the cleaning was done, I could barelly see a difference between the cleaned seat an the dirty one. So I went at it again using a hand brush and applying pressure. Again, no real difference. I switched to Meguiar's Super Degreaser 4:1 with a hand brush. This time I saw a major improvement but the seat was still dirty. I could see uneven colors in the leather and there were clearly dirty spots. So I switched again to an orange degreaser. This time the seat came perfectly clean, even on parts I had not touched before.

After wiping everything down with a damp microfiber towel to remove all the degreaser, I applied Meguiar's Gold Class Leather cleaner and conditionner. The seats looked brand new.

Leather is coated with a clearcoat similar to what you have on the paint. It's extremelly durable. Leather cleaners are designed to clean delicate uncoated leather, so they are too weak for any real cleaning. Usually an APC will do a good job, but sometimes they are simply too weak for very heavy dirt and grime from years of use on leather.

Here are the pictures: Vokkswagen Passat 2006