minngolfer
TYF Newbie
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- Sep 1, 2010
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Just thought I'd give a brief overview on my install of aftermarket leather in my 2008 Tahoe LT.
I purchased the vehicle about 2 weeks ago and the dealer quoted me $1200 to have the front two rows swapped from cloth to leather. Too rich for my blood. Found a clearance set of gray Katzkin leather seat covers on ebay for $369, just the front two rows, which was fine as I have removed my third row.
I initially thought I'd have a local upholstery shop do the install but the lowest price to install them was $400 (plus my $369 I had paid for the leather covers). Don't waste your money!
So the rear seat took approximately 4 hours to install, most of it due to the fact that I didn't take it out of the vehicle to install.
A couple helpful hints for the rear 60/40 seat....
1) You will need to disconnect the middle seatbelt in two places. You will need a T30 star bit, and a T55 star bit. The T30 is for the top plastic piece where the seatbelt retracts into the seat. The T55 is for where the seatbelt bolts to the frame (flip forward the 40% seat and leave the 60% down, remove plastic side trip panel and bolt for T55 will be exposeD)
2) You will need to remove the bottom plastic on the underside of the seat bottoms, there should be 5 bolts on the 60% side of the bench (3 in rear, 2 in front) and 4 bolts on the 40% side (2 in front, 2 in back). These will all be removed with the T30 star bit.
The fronts were a bit easier, except for the challenge of locating the appropriate star sockets to remove the floor bolts that hold the seats in. Checked AutoZone, Ace Hardware, Lowes and Home Depot. Don't bother, they won't have the ones you need.
Go to Harbor Freight Tools, you will need a deep socket E14 and E18. GM just had to go and use two different sizes! You will also need to remove the seat belt by removing the small plastic panel near the power seat controls, under the panel you'll find a bolt and use an E18 Star Socket to take it off.
The cloth covers for both the back and front are very easy to remove and replace, but I highly recommend having someone there to help when the leather needs to be stretched to get the clips to connect.
You'll find that the rear seats have velcro in the crevices to hold the upholstery down, the Katzkins will be the exact same, so be careful when removing so you don't rip the velcro off.
Up front there is no velcro, there are small clips that hold the piping of the seams in place, they will rip of the seat foam very easily, so remove slowly and with care. The new covers snap right in.
The fronts took about an hour total, much easier than the rears. Do yourself a favor though and take them out of the vehicle!
The headrests and map pockets were the last challenge. The headrests were a two person job. Remove them and have one person squish the headrest while the other trys to pull the existing cover off.
After removing the old cover have one person squish the headrest while the other person slides the new one on. This sounds much quicker than it is, this will take some muscle. You will finally need to use a blade to cut a hole in the leather on the top of seats to reveal the headrest post holes. (An fyi, when taking the headrests out of the old seats covers you will need to used a screwdriver to pry off the circular caps that covers the holes where the seat posts go in, this will expose some spring buttoms that will allow you to fully remove the headrests)
For the map pockets I simply removed the cloth pockets off of the plastic backing by prying off the staples, I then used some shallow mount staples in my manual staple gun to wrap and attach the leather pockets. This is a 5 minutes task, by far the easiest part of the install.
Total cost of install:
-$369 for Katzkin leather seat covers from ebay
-$30 s/h
-$5.99 for T30 Star Bit from Autozone
-$5.99 for T55 Star Bit from AutoZone
-$9.99 for deep socket star set from Harbor Freight tools (has E18 and E14 included in set, you won't likely find the two sold on their own in most stores)
-About 6 hours of my time
-Some blood and skin from my hands/fingers (careful, several sharp edges on the bottom sides of the seats)
-A lot of sweat (it was 105 degrees in my garage here in Phoenix)
So not a bad overall cost, call it $422 plus a six-pack of Bud Lights!
Next up, getting rid of the crappy factory non-bose stereo!
UPDATE: For those non-believers and those asking for some pics, here you go! I know I'm going to take some heat for the carseat, but hey, the little man has to ride somewhere!
THE TOOLS NEEDED!
I purchased the vehicle about 2 weeks ago and the dealer quoted me $1200 to have the front two rows swapped from cloth to leather. Too rich for my blood. Found a clearance set of gray Katzkin leather seat covers on ebay for $369, just the front two rows, which was fine as I have removed my third row.
I initially thought I'd have a local upholstery shop do the install but the lowest price to install them was $400 (plus my $369 I had paid for the leather covers). Don't waste your money!
So the rear seat took approximately 4 hours to install, most of it due to the fact that I didn't take it out of the vehicle to install.
A couple helpful hints for the rear 60/40 seat....
1) You will need to disconnect the middle seatbelt in two places. You will need a T30 star bit, and a T55 star bit. The T30 is for the top plastic piece where the seatbelt retracts into the seat. The T55 is for where the seatbelt bolts to the frame (flip forward the 40% seat and leave the 60% down, remove plastic side trip panel and bolt for T55 will be exposeD)
2) You will need to remove the bottom plastic on the underside of the seat bottoms, there should be 5 bolts on the 60% side of the bench (3 in rear, 2 in front) and 4 bolts on the 40% side (2 in front, 2 in back). These will all be removed with the T30 star bit.
The fronts were a bit easier, except for the challenge of locating the appropriate star sockets to remove the floor bolts that hold the seats in. Checked AutoZone, Ace Hardware, Lowes and Home Depot. Don't bother, they won't have the ones you need.
Go to Harbor Freight Tools, you will need a deep socket E14 and E18. GM just had to go and use two different sizes! You will also need to remove the seat belt by removing the small plastic panel near the power seat controls, under the panel you'll find a bolt and use an E18 Star Socket to take it off.
The cloth covers for both the back and front are very easy to remove and replace, but I highly recommend having someone there to help when the leather needs to be stretched to get the clips to connect.
You'll find that the rear seats have velcro in the crevices to hold the upholstery down, the Katzkins will be the exact same, so be careful when removing so you don't rip the velcro off.
Up front there is no velcro, there are small clips that hold the piping of the seams in place, they will rip of the seat foam very easily, so remove slowly and with care. The new covers snap right in.
The fronts took about an hour total, much easier than the rears. Do yourself a favor though and take them out of the vehicle!
The headrests and map pockets were the last challenge. The headrests were a two person job. Remove them and have one person squish the headrest while the other trys to pull the existing cover off.
After removing the old cover have one person squish the headrest while the other person slides the new one on. This sounds much quicker than it is, this will take some muscle. You will finally need to use a blade to cut a hole in the leather on the top of seats to reveal the headrest post holes. (An fyi, when taking the headrests out of the old seats covers you will need to used a screwdriver to pry off the circular caps that covers the holes where the seat posts go in, this will expose some spring buttoms that will allow you to fully remove the headrests)
For the map pockets I simply removed the cloth pockets off of the plastic backing by prying off the staples, I then used some shallow mount staples in my manual staple gun to wrap and attach the leather pockets. This is a 5 minutes task, by far the easiest part of the install.
Total cost of install:
-$369 for Katzkin leather seat covers from ebay
-$30 s/h
-$5.99 for T30 Star Bit from Autozone
-$5.99 for T55 Star Bit from AutoZone
-$9.99 for deep socket star set from Harbor Freight tools (has E18 and E14 included in set, you won't likely find the two sold on their own in most stores)
-About 6 hours of my time
-Some blood and skin from my hands/fingers (careful, several sharp edges on the bottom sides of the seats)
-A lot of sweat (it was 105 degrees in my garage here in Phoenix)
So not a bad overall cost, call it $422 plus a six-pack of Bud Lights!
Next up, getting rid of the crappy factory non-bose stereo!
UPDATE: For those non-believers and those asking for some pics, here you go! I know I'm going to take some heat for the carseat, but hey, the little man has to ride somewhere!
THE TOOLS NEEDED!
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