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building seats

W

W Vaughan

Active member
Decided to build new seats instead of buy them. Anyone else done this? in planning to coat them with resin before i upholster them.
WVaughan
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I am doing the same thing. I used the original wood from 1987 as patterns, and am re-using the foam since it is still in great shape. I ordered the seat covers from Checkmate and they are starting on them Friday or Monday. Mike did tell me to wrap the foam in dry-cleaner plastic so it makes the seat covers go on smoother.

As for the wood, after cutting to shape, I applied a medium coat of resin, sanded it down a little to knock off the bumps, then added another heavier coat of resin. Might be overkill but I need these to last.

But here is a question back to the board... most people say you have to use stainless staples to assemble the seat covers, but i spoke with a guy the other day that said use regular staples and cover them with silicone. That way they still rust a little and the rust prevents the staple from backing out of the wood. Makes some sense, but I don't know. Comments or opinions??
 
btrbill said:
....i spoke with a guy the other day that said use regular staples and cover them with silicone. That way they still rust a little and the rust prevents the staple from backing out of the wood. .... Comments or opinions??
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Not that I know much about doing upholstry, but I don't buy that. For one thing everybody that has experience doing upholstry says to use stainless staples, if there were a better solution it seems like these people would have found it over the course of their many years of experience.

There's not a bunch of force on those staples acting to pull them out (that would be a force straight out of the wood). Most all the force applied is perpindicular to that direction, caused by the pull of the vinyl fabric, to me this sounds like a non-issue.

Silicone emits acetic acid as it cures, that's going to hasten the corrosion process on any metal (once upon a time I knew a young engineer who thought it would be a good idea to seal up some data cable connectors with silicone - less than a year later thay all failed because the copper wire had corroded).
 
groundloop said:
Not that I know much about doing upholstry, but I don't buy that. For one thing everybody that has experience doing upholstry says to use stainless staples, if there were a better solution it seems like these people would have found it over the course of their many years of experience.

There's not a bunch of force on those staples acting to pull them out (that would be a force straight out of the wood). Most all the force applied is perpindicular to that direction, caused by the pull of the vinyl fabric, to me this sounds like a non-issue.

Silicone emits acetic acid as it cures, that's going to hasten the corrosion process on any metal (once upon a time I knew a young engineer who thought it would be a good idea to seal up some data cable connectors with silicone - less than a year later thay all failed because the copper wire had corroded).
Click to expand...

Well Done!
 
I'm building new captains chairs. Bottom is 3/4 ply and the curved back is 2 layers of 3/8. How were the originally constructed? Mine were missing so I have no pattern to go by. Just made up my own.
 
No way. Stainless staples in a boat or any open environment. Seen and owned too many re-upholstered boats with regular staples. Lost a sun pad cover due to rusted staples.

Nice to know that about silicone Groudnloop. Explains alot of why things never quite worked like I expected after coating wire nuts with silicone.
 
W Vaughan said:
I'm building new captains chairs. Bottom is 3/4 ply and the curved back is 2 layers of 3/8. How were the originally constructed? Mine were missing so I have no pattern to go by. Just made up my own.
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My captain chairs are molded fiberglass with a 3/8 ply wood bottom .
 
On a boat I had, the factory made seat backs were 1/4" plywood. I believe they clamped the cut backs around an object like a round barrel to get the shape. Then, they put two strips of fiberglass mat on the backs in an X pattern, then coated the whole thing in resin. Once it was dry It was screwed to the 3/4" seat base with brass screws and the upholstery was stapled on using monel or S/S staples.
 
as others have said, definitely use stainless staples and definitely spend the money on marine plywood. also just rebuilt my rear bench seat and they used crown staples to hold the two pieces of the seat back together so you might want to get a crown staple gun and some stainless crown staples too
 
bigredinohio said:
Just curious as to how the seats turned out? Do you have any pictures?
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not sure if your asking about my seats or not, but i can try to take some pics in a couple days if you want some..i dont have any progress pics tho and i re-used my old vinyl and foam
 
While I'm waiting in my hull to dry out I figured I would go ahead and finish my bucket seats. Problem im having I'm not exactly sure how to attach the skins and hide all the staples. I don't have factory pieces to go by. Anyone have any pics of the process or some instructions for me?

Thanks
W Vaughan
 
I had real detailed pics with a tape measure next to my seats when I did them. For some reason, I can't find them now. I think I still have my original seat if you need pics but not 100% sure. Original back was made of fiberglass but I did mine out of 1/2" wood. It was 5 pieces glued and then glassed together and then to the seat bottom.
 
Thanks Brian. I have the seats built. Just a little unsure how to attach the skins around the inside where the bottom and back meet.
 
watermark.php

Ifs pretty rough but hope this helps. You have a 1x2 flat around the bottom against the back. This is the nailing strip so the foam does not get distorted. (foam is tan and the cover is red) staple into the bottom with the head of the gun against the 1x2. If you have any questions, I will send you my number and you can call me
 
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