E21/E30: Crude Rear Seat Repair.

When the seats arrived the rear one had a noticeably big tear on the top of the back-rest. By the time I'd finished cleaning them however, there were now 3 tears along the same strip. I was being super-careful with the scrubbing brush, but after 25 years under the back-window the glue is coming away and the strands of twill fabric separate very easily indeed. An attempt to repair one of the splits only made it worse as the material is stretched by the glue and can't wait to rip.

I considered throwing the stock beige seats back in, but then had a moment of er, inspiration, and found a strip of spare material wedged into the frame behind. I cut it into patches and stuck them down with fabric spray-adhesive, £7.99 but it's strong stuff.

It's not the prettiest of repairs, despite matching the lines up, but looks better than threadbare, won't get any worse now and the interior of the car looks a lot fresher with them in I must say. If they're going to stay though, a permanent cover-up will be needed - probably in the form of a parcel-shelf re-trim. The beige carpet could do with a refresh, so I may extend the fabric past the shelf and have it cascade over the back-rest slightly. We will see.