The Upholstery Forum

I think I was asking already but have brain fart right now. This is what seat center looks like (top and bottom similar). Those are Recaro seats from old BMW. They have separate bolsters and mains.

I want to make bolsters in leather and centers in Ultrasuede.

Look at how factory done. They have leather, batting material and heating element right in-between. I get it, it works with thick leather. But in my case it's going to be Ultrasuede. And I'm going to use 1/2 sew foam instead of batting.


Do you think I should install heater right under suede? Maybe use some additional padding material? Just not sure how to do this part correctly so it looks and lasts.

Every time I’ve added seat heater, I did it right under the leather or cloth. I’m not sure if this is to manufacturer specs, but it was how I was taught to do them by another employee there. Seemed to work great. Just want to make sure on cloth material mostly that it’s thick enough to hide any edges or such from the element.

@Cody In my case it is factory and it is right next to leather so you are right.

UltraSuede I got not thin, but it's much softer than leather, I'm hesitant putting heating element right next to it. Do you think maybe gluing additional layer of something to ultrasuede is a good idea?

@IvanD,

Good topic and curious myself. Perhaps a thin heat conducting material is just the ticket!

I would think in this case something wouldn’t hurt. More so to hide it and also maybe to keep a bit of heat away from the material. Not sure if the heat will effect it in any way. I wonder if sewing another layer of something different to the back of your suede in the build process would help any. Idk if you can put foam right on an element. Maybe 1/4 sew foam. It should be able to penetrate that with the heat.