Rear Upholstery Panels

[BigCat83]

The rear upholstery panels in my '97 Eldorado are all coming apart, splitting at the assembly seams, curling up and generally looking like h*ll. The passenger door panel is begininning to do the same. A while back I remember reading, somewhere, a TSB (?) about this problem and a repair kit GM made available to correct this. The time has come for action! I don't know if I'm going to attempt to repair the original panels (most cost effective), repair the originals and cover with leather (expensive but very Mercedes-ish...LOL) or replace with new. Of course the new panels and covering the originals with leather will be expensive, but it's only money... And I bet that would look real good and improve the car,after all the Northstar is first class. And my headliner is starting to sag. A new black suede leather headliner would look really good.

I would imagine others have had similar problems with these parts; did you repair/replace them and how did that work out?

Any advice?

[BodybyFisher]

I am sorry to hear this. I have gone through this with a couple of cars the last of which was a 91 Seville that the vinyl shrunk on and became brittle. Locally I have a fanatic, that does interior detail work and repairs. He sort of reminds me of the guys you see on TV that create interiors for Coddington's cars, etc. That said, you might find a car in a local scrap yard with a good interior also or purchase a second car with a pristine interior.

Yesterday I replaced the seat spring in my drivers seat and while the job was successful, I noticed that my seat back frame was cracked in the hinge area and I am going to have problems one day soon, so I am looking for a new drivers seat.. F**K!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am sure that it is broken from pushing back on my seat back to get change, etc out of my pockets, I need to stop doing that.

Its always something and I am beginning to realize that rebuilding the mechanicals while a great thing to do, only leads to the interior that eventually begins to self destruct. I recently fixed the dashpad that was curling up.

I guess all of the glues, and foams and vinyl shrinks, dries out and disintegrates over time due to age and the temperature extremes.