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[Scott D]

When using an existing seat cover as a pattern do you account for age of the material and the amount of stretch when marking and cutting the new panels?

[John]

Depends if you think its stretched or not. Vinyl and leather are usually fine to just make patterns off of. Cloth and be more difficult. You have to use your best judgment.
Usually if you just focus on laying the edges of the pattern down flat and natural as possible even if that makes a bubble in the middle. You will be very close to what you need. The edges of the pattern are where the seam was and that usually stretches very little or not at all. If you flatten the part of your pattern where it wants to bubble up you will essentially make you pattern larger and misshaped. Also it depends if you adding scrim foam or not. I typically use 1/2 scrim on the face and 1/4 on the sides. This smooths and fills out the cover nicely but also depends on the look your going for. Also don't forget to steam your seat foam to bring the foam back to its natural shape.

You can get a very very good result with patterning from existing seat covers but the only to get a perfect fit is making patterns from scratch. This takes longer so it depends on the level of the job and how intact the existing cover is.

Great question! Hope this helps.

[BigRig]

Time is money! 45 minutes to pull staples out of a plastic chair base my god! Where is the staple vacuum when you need it?