rovertrippin
New Member
- Joined
- Oct 11, 2014
- Posts
- 2
- Reaction score
- 9
Hi all,
I just wanted to share my experience since I found this thread so helpful. Just recently purchased a 2016 LandMark with only one flaw, this dreaded shrinking and peeling leather dash. My intention was to find a used replacement, but after searching and searching I could not find an exact match. I got fed up at looking at the dash one day and decided to dive in and see if I could at least glue it down flat so it wouldn’t be as distracting. Well, this turned into quite a project after experimenting with ways to restore the leather as best as possible. See pictures of my experience below.
I’ll spare the tare down details as that’s been covered here before. You can also find a few helpful videos on YouTube.
1. Here was the state on my dash with about an inch of shrinkage at the worst point and stitches broken in the two middle stitch lines. The leather looks shiny because I treated with loads of leather conditioner to rehydrate the dried out shrunken leather. It was severely dehydrated as a made several applications until the leather could not soak in anymore.
2. The conditioner worked well to make the leather smooth and pliable again, but I was not able to restore the shape from the shrinkage damage. I did some searching for methods restoring shrunken leather, but came to the conclusion it was impossible and the leather needed to be replaced. Until I came across methods for stretching new leather and gave that a shot. HEAT only shrinks shrunken leather even more, but alcohol was looked promising so I gave it a shoot. It supposedly opens the pores of the leather and allows it to expand?
I kept soaking the leather if 50/50 water and isopropyl alcohol while trying to stretch the leather by hand. To my surprise it was releasing the shrunken portions of the leather slowly.
3. After my hands got sore I came up with another strategy. The alcohol/water mix kept drying up so I used some rags drenched in the solution to keep it moist. Then I clamped some weights about 3-5 pounds per clamp to the leather in order to maintain constant pulling force. I layered the leather with pvc slats to prevent the leather from getting damaged. I also tilted and tied down the dashboard so the force of the weight was pulling in the direction I wanted the leather to move.
A huge improvement showed after 4 hours and the leather had moved 3/4 of an inch. I did notice that after a while the leather would shrink again by a 1/4 inch.
>>>
I just wanted to share my experience since I found this thread so helpful. Just recently purchased a 2016 LandMark with only one flaw, this dreaded shrinking and peeling leather dash. My intention was to find a used replacement, but after searching and searching I could not find an exact match. I got fed up at looking at the dash one day and decided to dive in and see if I could at least glue it down flat so it wouldn’t be as distracting. Well, this turned into quite a project after experimenting with ways to restore the leather as best as possible. See pictures of my experience below.
I’ll spare the tare down details as that’s been covered here before. You can also find a few helpful videos on YouTube.
1. Here was the state on my dash with about an inch of shrinkage at the worst point and stitches broken in the two middle stitch lines. The leather looks shiny because I treated with loads of leather conditioner to rehydrate the dried out shrunken leather. It was severely dehydrated as a made several applications until the leather could not soak in anymore.
2. The conditioner worked well to make the leather smooth and pliable again, but I was not able to restore the shape from the shrinkage damage. I did some searching for methods restoring shrunken leather, but came to the conclusion it was impossible and the leather needed to be replaced. Until I came across methods for stretching new leather and gave that a shot. HEAT only shrinks shrunken leather even more, but alcohol was looked promising so I gave it a shoot. It supposedly opens the pores of the leather and allows it to expand?
I kept soaking the leather if 50/50 water and isopropyl alcohol while trying to stretch the leather by hand. To my surprise it was releasing the shrunken portions of the leather slowly.
3. After my hands got sore I came up with another strategy. The alcohol/water mix kept drying up so I used some rags drenched in the solution to keep it moist. Then I clamped some weights about 3-5 pounds per clamp to the leather in order to maintain constant pulling force. I layered the leather with pvc slats to prevent the leather from getting damaged. I also tilted and tied down the dashboard so the force of the weight was pulling in the direction I wanted the leather to move.
A huge improvement showed after 4 hours and the leather had moved 3/4 of an inch. I did notice that after a while the leather would shrink again by a 1/4 inch.
>>>
