Date:         Fri, 22 Sep 95 7:48:48 EDT
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         John Anderson <ja@coe.wvu.edu>
Subject:      Re: SewFine Seat Covers for '81 Vanagon (fwd)

> SewFine shows pre-formed foam seat back padding for earlier Busses in their
> catalog, but they didn't offer it for Vanagons yet.  They offered to sell
> me some sheet foam, but I found better prices locally.  I looked in the
> yellow pages and found several listings.  First I went to a fabric store,
> but they had only one grade of foam to offer, and it looked a little
> light-weight for the job.  Then I visited "House of Foam" in Palo Alto
> (insert standard conflict of interest disclaimer here).  They had several
> grades of stiffness to offer and the owner suggested the heaviest grade of
> upholstery foam in a 1" thickness.  I had been thinking about 1/2" foam,
> but I took his suggestion - I'm glad I did.  I bought a 48 X 24 piece, and
> it was plenty for both seats.  Cost about $14.
> 
> Lee

A little note here as I recently ordered WCM's "preformed" foam and
was highly not impressed.  Was simply a sheet 1" foam cut (too big)
with a strip glued on the edge.  IMHO will not allow the cushion to form
its origional contour well.  On my '76 I used 2 layers of high density
carpet pad (solid pad not the chopped stuff) over a layer of BURLAP.
VERY IMPORTANT WHATEVER YOU USE, PUT DOWN BURLAP ON THE SPRINGS FIRST.
VW did this on my '76 on the new '77 and '78 no burlap and horsehair
in much worse shape.  Then on top of the foam I put cotton batting (white)
like the origional grey stuff got it at local upolstery store, $5 enough for
front seats bottoms and backs.  Results were excellent.  For the '77
since I don't like the foam I sent it back but the guy I got the cotton
from can order 1" horse hair, they call it something like "pelotex".
I'm going to go this route, not preformed but the same feel and
"stiffness" like Lee wanted as origional.  This guy claims the newer
stuff lasts much better, he says he has seats he recovered 10 years back
with the stuff still in good shape.  I ordered enough for both fronts
for about $10.  Looks just like OEM, green rubberized but has a 1/4"
nylon screen on the side that hits the springs, still I will use burlap.
Good luck with seats everyone, I did all of em on the '76 with the
carpet pad though and they are still in nice shape 1 year later (used
2, 1/2" layers plus the cotton overstuffed em a bit so they could
settle).

John
ja@coe.wvu.edu