I will tell you about my experience of restoring the Porsche 911 (997), 12 years old, I got a car by chance, through a friend, an American, having worked under a contract in Europe for 5 years, returned home, and sold the car for funny money, at a price quite comparable to the new Lada. At the same time, the car has a real range of 70 thousand kilometers, confirmed by the dealer, the car is not beaten, although inside and the salon is quite crushed, he drove from home to the office and around the city, and this is frequent landings and landings... To import this car back to the states he did not want... Here and gave for the first proposed amount...
Having arranged the suspension and, in any case, having installed the eternal IMS, it was an intermediate shaft bearing (of what it is, as I will tell you another time), reworked the rear buffer from America to Europe (simply removing 2 rubber buffers and gluing large holes after them), put a wide number, and - took on the interior.
First, I bought a Pioneer magnet with navigation, touchscreen, good sound... Then, I thought about the skin in the cabin... I came to good acquaintances, engaged in stretching, almost with the mood to give them the keys right away...
Talking to them surprised me.
Do you make the car for yourself or for sale?
for myself
-there is such a matter...the skin, if natural, what is available, the price of the question with the work: chairs, doors, wheel, console 1800 euros, it is very beautiful, soft, smells delicious, the salon will be like new, noble, but all this is very short, skin is thin, in a couple of months will go bubbles, stretch, shorter, I do not recommend.
Or you can order expensive branded leather, but it is very expensive, a salon somewhere in 3 thousand euros will stand...
There is also a German vinyl, the quality is old, no wear, the price is half of natural leather, but after the natural quality German leather that already stands in the car, the look will be a little poor and not "Porschew"...
Try, restore the salon, yes, now the skin is all lost, wrinkles, folds, white spots on the background of the black skin of the chairs are just terrible, the pillows are sold, and it seems that everything is gone, but there is no hole on it, no scratch, and the rear seat in general, unused, just refresh it... In short, there is one way... it will not work, come, change the skin is never too late... And they told me a complete instruction, what and how to do...
I did everything as I was advised: on a warm and sunny summer day, I take a sponge, clothes, and half a liter of olive oil, carefully impregnate both front seats and also leather safety pillows in the door, almost all the bottle of oil (!), the excess oil carefully removed with a cloth, after which, I close the car and leave it for three days in the sunshine on the parking lot (in fact, a whole week has passed, left to rest)
When I arrive, I open the car...my god! The skin was beautifully swollen, it became swollen, soft, all the former weaknesses and wrinkles magically disappeared, the chairs became like new, although the appearance and damaged some white strips on the sides, but with this I will cope easily...
I take a black cream-painted Salamanca (in any case not Kiwi, I was warned by the masters), evenly paint the surface of the chairs with a sponge, leave for a couple of hours, then a special cleanser for the skin (there is on all tanks, the price of type 3 euros) - I treat the surface of the chairs, let it dry, take a white towel and polish the chairs pleasantly glittered, but the towel left a barely noticeable gray plaque, then again I repeat the procedure of cleaning the chairs with a white "cream - cleanser and conditioner for the skin", and again with a thinning white towel - it remains white! This means that all the paint has absorbed into the skin, the clothes will not be worn, any traces of wear completely disappeared, no wrinkles, folds... The chairs look... say, not so that the car just came out of the car with 0 km distance, but about as after 1 year of operation, not older, all clean, gentle, into the car became pleasant...
It remains only to say thank you to the guys from the company for the stretching of salons for honesty and useful advice, because in their interest it would be not to miss the client and load me a full stretch of the salon around the circle, for very good money. However, thanks to the excellent reputation, they have orders for almost six months in advance... Even advertising has stopped...