Day Two of TMI Seat Upholstery Installation: Unpacking the Back Seats

The second day of the TMI seat upholstery installation has begun, and I'm excited to tackle the back seats. As I mentioned earlier, the front seats were a bit more challenging, but the back seats are supposedly easier to work with. According to my research, this is because they don't require the hog rings that are used on the front seats. Instead, the back seats come with a more straightforward cover design, which makes sense given their lower profile.

My first impression of the back seats is that they need a bit more break-in time. The foam is quite thick, and you sit up a bit higher than you would in the front seats. This can make you feel like you're on a booster seat for a little while, but when you lean back into the seat, it feels really comfortable. I'm looking forward to seeing how this material will break in over time.

To begin with the installation, I started by identifying the tabs and clips that hold the seats together. After some trial and error, I managed to locate the first tab and began tugging on it. To my surprise, it wasn't as difficult as I expected, and I was able to remove the seat from the brackets with ease. My friends David and Edie (also known as "the Russian") were assisting me today, which made the process much more enjoyable.

Once I had removed the first seat, I moved on to the second one, which proved to be a bit more stubborn. However, with some patience and persistence, I was able to coax it out of its brackets as well. The 13 mm bolts that hold the seats in place were relatively simple to deal with, which is a relief.

The next step was to remove the upholstery itself. This involved tugging on the back of the seat cover, which revealed a plastic strip underneath. I must admit that I'm no expert when it comes to upholstery installation, but this part seemed manageable. The velcro and clips in place made it easy to rip off the old upholstery, and I was relieved to see that it wasn't as difficult as I thought it would be.

Now that the back seats are out, I can move on to the foam and cover installation. This involves pulling the cover over the foam and securing it with velcro straps. The process is quite straightforward once you understand what you're doing, but I did encounter some air bubbles along the way. With a bit of patience and persistence, however, these air bubbles disappeared, leaving me with a smooth, flat surface.

One of the challenges I faced when removing the back seats was dealing with the plastic clips that held them in place. These clips were quite stubborn at times, and it took some effort to remove them without breaking them. However, once I had managed to remove the clips, I was able to complete the installation with relative ease.

To ensure a snug fit, I used two velcro straps to secure the upholstery in place. This involved punching holes into the foam and then pulling the strap over the top of it. With some patience and care, I managed to get the straps to seal smoothly, which gave me confidence that the installation was complete.

The final result is a beautifully upholstered back seat that looks like new. The stitching and materials used by TMI are of high quality, and I'm pleased with how everything turned out. It's been an interesting experience installing the seats, but it's paid off in the end. Now that the seats are in place, I can focus on getting the car looking and feeling its best.

I want to extend a big thank you to TMI for sending me this kit. The experience was enjoyable, if not always easy, and the final result is well worth it. If you're considering installing your own seat upholstery, I would definitely recommend checking out TMI's products and tutorials. With a bit of patience and persistence, you can achieve professional-looking results that will enhance your car's interior.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enSaving Private Ryan upholstery Edition all right so day two of the TMI seat upholstery install the fronts did come out pretty good I'm probably going to take like a steam or a heat gun to them to get more wrinkles at later down the road but now I got to do the back seats and the back seats are supposedly easier than the front cuz you don't have to do the hog rings or anything like that supposedly it's more of a cover than a full upholstery kit the full uphol stre kit is more for the front seats which makes more sense but so far first driving impressions of the seats is they need to be broken a little bit more because the foam is very thick so you kind of sit a little bit higher and you feel like you're on a booster seat for a little bit but when you lean back into the seat it feels really really nice so over time it'll break in but for now I'm going to get started on the back seat I've never taken these back seats out before so Step One is I think you just kind of start to tug over here think there's tabs not exactly sure where they are but nope maybe have to something the bottom I don't know got it yeah all right got one go right here reach okay there's all right that wasn't too bad okay all right race car holy crap there's like potato chips how'd you get in there so the next step of taking the seat out is just some 13 mm bolts attached to some brackets and it's pretty simple thankfully all right and that was a lot easier beauty of a impact and that I have two friends helping me today and my buddy David he's also known as the Russian and then there's my buddy Edie is that just me and Andrew screaming at screaming at some upholstery that doesn't talk back all right there we go there's one ow I just fell I'm going to do this there this one is stubborn what all right so I was able to get it off the way I did it was these seats fold down on their own um so you can have some EXT extra storage space um so when they're folded down what you do is you rep a a little tiny kind of ribbon that sticks out it's just like a piece of cloth that you pull on and so what I did is I lifted it and then I pulled on what would naturally make it fall down and that's where got it out next is uh the upholstery itself so basically you start you tug on the back and like I said I am no expert at this guys this is my first radio with some like velcro and whatnot and now all you're left with is this plastic thing after this is gone we're going to tear the rest of it off cuz we don't use any of it and so far I am digging this installation way more than the front so take that and you kind of take it from the sides it seems like and you kind of work your way down I've gotten to the headrest like I said before I'm sure there's a easier way to get it off but I'm not using these anymore so I'm just going to cut them I just don't care a why you do this I feel like I'm like doing battle surgery you're going to make it Saving Private Ryan upholstery Edition the bottom part of the upholster you have a bunch of Clips in the back best way to do that is by using a tool like this this saved my booty on the front seats and uh thankfully we still have it and you just go clip by clip and they go all the way around so hopefully I don't break any cuz that's what I'm really good at there's one two there's a bunch of these like uh u-shaped clips that you go over like this and you pull that didn't feel good okay and then there's that velcro on top there's this purple velcro holding on the upholstery as well so they did not mess around with the upholstery like it's not easy to get off think I have all the clips so let's see if it did its job oh it did its job all right holding on and it's still holding on back here there stupid thing so the kit I have I think is a little Universal because I had headrest covers for it that were made but the actual seat covers didn't have anywhere for the headrest to go cuz I think this is made for a uh 2005 all the way to like 2014 so some of the back seats had headrest and some of them didn't so I think they put that in place in case you wanted to cut up here but I do not have the upholstery experience to do pretty cuts and whatnot so what I did was delete the headrest completely so when I have the foam itself like this I can just slide the cover on and use the velcro and go from there what the upholstery is on snug you have these two velcro straps and then you just punch into it like this and it'll start to seal the upholstery at first you're going to have this wicked really bad uh air bubble and you're going to be like I did not do this right but once you do this it'll go flush with the uh foam bu all right yeah we got to get the bottom all right guys T my seats are fully installed the front seats are now done the back seats weren't as quote unquote difficult they were just more of a bear because of all the plastic clips that wanted to break on you or you had to pull the leather as strong as you could and then it just wouldn't clip so that was the issue with that you didn't have to do foam or hog rings on the back but it was still pretty tough I'm not going to lie so big thanks to TMI for sending me this kit it was an interesting experience and I had a kind of great time doing it it it really paid off in the end the bat came out pretty good with some trial and error we had to take out the seats again and uh mess more with the clips and things of that nature and now they are officially in the back of the car so hope you guys like the stitching and everything else that TMI provided and I will see you guys next time and take it easy have a fantastic day\n"