Leather dash repair

[Tfp]

The leather dash is a nice option to have but I've seen quite a few cars where it's peeled away, or has swollen.

It put me off buying an otherwise lovely car in the past.

So has anyone had one repaired/recovered?

I see quite a few of the Jap imports have it bad, and a lovely 3.0 sport just advertised on Autotrader has it really bad.

Or has anyone taken a standard dash and had it covered?

Tim

 

[hard top]

Source:

Z3 Extended Leather Peeling Dash Repair (long)

The Problem My car is a 98 2.8 with a tanin red, extended leather interior. Car has been garaged and does not excessively sit in the sun. Many tanin red, extended leather owners have mentioned peeling. (see pic) Most common is the passenger side airbag cover and instrument panel bezel. The...

www.bimmerfest.com

The Problem

My car is a 98 2.8 with a tanin red, extended leather interior. Car has been garaged and does not excessively sit in the sun. Many tanin red, extended leather owners have mentioned peeling. (see pic) Most common is the passenger side airbag cover and instrument panel bezel. The leather shrinks and peels from the edges. Other difficulties are the glue lifting and creating bubbles.

New Parts

New parts are $$$. Whole dash is approximately $2700
driver's side, complete instrument panel section-$1000
passenger side, complete section-$1000
passenger side airbag cover-$300

Repair Procedures

Repair involves removing the whole dashboard which includes removing console, all switches, radio, heater, airbag, steering wheel, instrument panel assembly, turn signal and wiper stalks, lower dashboard, then the whole dashboard! At that point, you either replace the parts with new ones or take off the damaged part from the main dashboard and have it recovered in new leather. In most cases, the leather cannot be "restretched".

Leather Replacement

The first step is to find a competent repair shop. I chose a restoration shop with a full time upholsterer. I discussed the project and decided to take my dash apart and bring the instrument panel bezel to be reupholstered. I cannot imagine how expensive it would be having to pay for labor to take dash apart, do the repair and then reinstall dash.

I had two choices for leather:

have the shop supply the leather and match the color-approximate cost was $100

buy half a hide from BMW for $330 (see pic)

this is what I did. I would also have extra leather for the future. It took calls to three dealers before I could find a piece from Germany. I was told there were 12 rolls left. Be diligent when ordering these unusual parts and find a competent parts department who will work with you. (thanks to Real OEM for preliminary research). Shipping took 3 weeks. The piece I received was approximately 8' by 3'. The upholsterer took 2 1/2 hours to do the repair and charged $178.

Instrument Panel Bezel Removal

Once the dash is out, turn it over and remove some plastic brackets, driver's side defroster vent and plastic vent tubes to gain access to the driver's side instrument panel assembly. Once removed, the curved top panel must be separated from the black plastic oval section that holds the actual instruments. Because I had no directions at this point, I chose to remove the black oval section, along with the curved leather top, as one unit. The black oval piece is held in with some plastic tabs that are melted over a slot. (see pics) I ground them off and separated the two pieces from the main, curved dash section. Next, the curved leather top can be removed. Ther are 3 tabs with screws and speed nuts, however, once removed the top was still attached at the front, lower corners. Something was holding them on the black plastic oval piece. After many attempts, I managed to unsnap the cover. There is a large tab with a small projection on it on the underside of the leather cover. (see pic) This snaps into a slot with a hole on the black plastic oval part. It takes a lot of force to pull them apart. I never did find an easy way to do this and it makes an awful noise when it comes apart, like plastic breaking, but the tabs are thick and appear to be rugged. Now all three pieces were apart. (see pic) You can see how much the leather has shrunk by the underside picture. The black curved edge was where the leather was originally attached. (see pic)

Reassembly

Reassembly is straight forward. Snap on the top and attach the three screws. Fit the top and black oval part into the tabs that were previously melted. Once fitted, I had to use some glue to keep them together because the tab extensions were now level with the slot. There are also some other screws that secure a different area of this assembly to the oval section of the dash. Next, secure the total driver's section to the main dash, put back the brackets and vents and begin reinstallation of the whole dash.

Notes

When trying to separate the leather top from the black oval plastic piece, there may be a different method the would not involve grinding off the melted tabs. (I have not tried this, but thought it may be possible once I got things fully apart) The leather top is secured with three screw and speednuts at the back, but still held on by the two snap tabs at the front. It may be possible to separate the top by just pulling up? Be cautious and proceed at your own risk. This way will not give as much access because the black oval section is still attached to the main driver's section. This limited access may pose other problems?

While the dash is out, replace heater and dash bulbs.

The top of the dash is atttached to the body with 3 screws covered with round plastic covers. These are difficult to remove. They are held in place with 3 tabs. The best way to remove them is to use a thin plastic pry tool or a thick credit card cut to a taper and try to pry it under the cover starting at the edge away from the windshield (the edge closest to the driver). Be careful when prying these because you don't want to gouge the plastic on your main dash. Don't use metal. If all else fails (and I had to use this with one cover) just "sacrifice" the cover by poking a hole in the middle (not easily done, but doable) and then just pry it up. Covers are $5, scratches and gouges in the dash are forever. Once removed, the bolts are obvious, but you need a stubby rachet set up because of the angle of the dash to the windshield, there is not much height. Once removed, the nuts have a very small brass spacer on them. Be careful when removing.

Removing the console and dash takes some research, especially when disconnectiong the electrical connectors. Lots of good articles. I used this one for the console. http://www.368s.com/review.phtml?ArticleID=107

In the end, I spent $500 and I have more leather left. Removing the console and dashboard is a medium level project. Get good info, take pictures, make notes and go slow. In the end, you save hundreds in labor and gain confidence and satisfication for a job well done.

 

[hard top]

 

[Tfp]

Thank you @hard top

Removing the dash is a bit beyond my abilities, explains why owners are selling their cars without repairing, a rather time consuming repair.

 

[hard top]

explains why owners are selling their cars without repairing

To be honest, I would never buy a car with a leather dash.

 

[Mnbrennan]

I had mine repaired by a local leather place

 

[Tfp]

I had mine repaired by a local leather place

Did you remove your dash and take it to them?

 

[Jack Ratt]

My car has extended leather and my passenger airbag cover has gone a little baggy. The leather has also slightly shrunk on the instrument console.

 

[hard top]

The leather has also slightly shrunk on the instrument console.

More to add to your 'things to do list' then Ratty ....

 

[Jack Ratt]

More to add to your 'things to do list' then Ratty ....

It's been like that for the last 4yrs and it will probably be the same for the next 4

 

[NZ00Z3]

I've taken the time to remove the dash and repair it with the original leather. Link below

It wasn't too bad a job. The dash removal is well documented in the Bentley manual. Having done 1, I now look for higher powered Z3's with peeling leather dashes as Buy it, Fix it Flick it opportunity.

http://www.bimmerforums.com/forum/showthread.php?2240068-Leather-Dash-Repairs

 

[Mnbrennan]

Did you remove your dash and take it to them?

I bought the dash so it was already out of the car. The instrument binnacle can be removed from the rest of the dash which is where I had it worst

 

[jmaiza]

To be honest, I would never buy a car with a leather dash.

HOW DID YOU DO THE REPAIR IF YOU WOULD NEVER BUY A CAR WITH A LEATHER DASH?

YOU DIDN'T DO THE REPAIR...I DID!

YOU COPIED MY POST. IT IS NOT YOURS...ITS MINE. MY WORK. MY PICTURES. MY DASH. MY WORDS!

I authored that post many years ago on another forum. Its really dishonest and arrogant of you to copy my work and pawn it off as your own as if you did the repair. At the very least, give credit to the original author and cite your source. Don't pretend it was yours!

And you even have the nerve to put your name, Mike, at the bottom of each post (#2 and #3).

To everyone on this forum and in this post, here is where the original post originated by me...and my name is Joe, not Mike.

Z3 Extended Leather Peeling Dash Repair (long)

The Problem My car is a 98 2.8 with a tanin red, extended leather interior. Car has been garaged and does not excessively sit in the sun. Many tanin red, extended leather owners have mentioned peeling. (see pic) Most common is the passenger side airbag cover and instrument panel bezel. The...

www.bimmerfest.com

 

[hard top]

Good morning @jmaiza,
I did not post under my name, it was a copy and paste, that is why the italic text has been used as at the time there was a problem with the forum with posting attachments.

Also I would not be discussing the cost of doing such work using USD.
I hope that explains my above post on this forum, I am sorry for any misunderstanding.

 

[GazHyde]

HOW DID YOU DO THE REPAIR IF YOU WOULD NEVER BUY A CAR WITH A LEATHER DASH?

YOU DIDN'T DO THE REPAIR...I DID!

YOU COPIED MY POST. IT IS NOT YOURS...ITS MINE. MY WORK. MY PICTURES. MY DASH. MY WORDS!

I authored that post many years ago on another forum. Its really dishonest and arrogant of you to copy my work and pawn it off as your own as if you did the repair. At the very least, give credit to the original author and cite your source. Don't pretend it was yours!

And you even have the nerve to put your name, Mike, at the bottom of each post (#2 and #3).

To everyone on this forum and in this post, here is where the original post originated by me...and my name is Joe, not Mike.

Z3 Extended Leather Peeling Dash Repair (long)

The Problem My car is a 98 2.8 with a tanin red, extended leather interior. Car has been garaged and does not excessively sit in the sun. Many tanin red, extended leather owners have mentioned peeling. (see pic) Most common is the passenger side airbag cover and instrument panel bezel. The...

www.bimmerfest.com

I know Mike very well, and I will stand 100% behind that he was not claiming this was his. The only thing Mike should have done at the time is link to the source of the information. You have now corrected that fact, and Mike has apologised. I've edited the post and added the source link.

For reference it only says his name at the bottom because it's displaying his signature text underneath which includes his name, same functionality as an email signature.

 

[Woodsta888]

Cheers Mike!

 

[jmaiza]

Thanks to both of you for adding the source to the post. I appreciate it. Job well done!

 

[Sajk]

Does anyone perhaps have the part number for tanin red leather. Mine is still ok but I have owned the car for 22 years and having recently invested heavily in it I want to keep it forever. I am recently finding that some parts (like floor mats) are just not available so I want to stock some leather. And if anyone has tanin red mats I will have them please.

 

[jmaiza]

When I did my repair over a decade ago, the amount of tanin leather hides was very limited. Mine was ordered from Germany.

You can try to find a match from another manufacturer or have a custom dye made. Even when I got my hide, the grain was a bit different.

Since my repair, my passenger side bezel has started to stretch and is exposed. I have just left it and live with it, even though I have some extra leather. I did see a few other posts (not sure which board it was from) where someone stretched their leather and secured it to the back of the plastic with miniature pins. Whatever method is employed it is a major job to get the bezels out (dash and console removed, separate bezels, find a qualified leather repair facility, then re-assemble). Leather dash covering is certainly problematic.

 

[Space_coyote]

When I did my repair over a decade ago, the amount of tanin leather hides was very limited. Mine was ordered from Germany.

You can try to find a match from another manufacturer or have a custom dye made. Even when I got my hide, the grain was a bit different.

Since my repair, my passenger side bezel has started to stretch and is exposed. I have just left it and live with it, even though I have some extra leather. I did see a few other posts (not sure which board it was from) where someone stretched their leather and secured it to the back of the plastic with miniature pins. Whatever method is employed it is a major job to get the bezels out (dash and console removed, separate bezels, find a qualified leather repair facility, then re-assemble). Leather dash covering is certainly problematic.

Is it the replacement leather that’s also now shrinking? Or is it a piece that didn’t need replacing when you did the rest?