Does anyone have any information on disassembling a seat for an X300? How is the upper section removed from the lower section? Are the upper sections interchangeable from right to left seats? The reason why I ask is because there are alot more clean passengers seats than drivers seats sitting in the salvage yards and I was wondering if they could come to use in repairing sections of the drivers seat. I already know the lower sections are different,it's the upper one I'm concerned with?

 

A very good question. I have often wondered this too. I dont know the answer, but would be inclined to think they are the same. You might want to think about looking in UK salvage yards: our clean passenger seats would be perfect replacements for your driver seats. And vice versa, obviously.

 

That was one of my first thoughts but the cost of shipping was crazy. I had actually located a clean drivers seat across the US but the shipping cost alone was a few hundred dollars not including the cost of the seat. Because of the size and shape of a seat it's not practical to have them shipped,at least long distances.

 

Several years ago I purchased some New Old Stock seat cushions for our XJ40 from a U.K. seller, who kindly removed the leather from the frames and just shipped me the leather. This made the shipping cost much more affordable, and I didn't need the frames anyway.

Depending on the model, the main issues you may run into are holes for screws, seat hinges or controls in places that don't match your frames. For example, manual seat controls were much more common in the U.K., so some seat backs have holes for the manual recline adjustment on one side panel. But do your homework and you may find exactly what you're looking for. If you're willing to redye the leather yourself, you don't even have to worry about the color.

Cheers,

Don

 

The problem I seem to come across is that there are listings for reproduction seat covers for a standard XJ6 but no one shows them for the VDP models. The re-dying problem that comes into effect is that it would be hard to do any kind of color change due to the different colored piping on the seats of the VDP. So far,every upholstery place that I've gone to (there are at least four close by) have either quoted me at a high price just to do one seat or won't even touch the job due to the specific stitch pattern that Jaguar used.

 

I did the dying myself for our VDP. Yes, it's a little more time-consuming to do the contrasting piping, and you have to buy two different dye colors, but it's not as hard as you might think if you have any artistic talent at all. Here's a link to photos of my first dye work, before I found the new leather from the U.K.:

VDP Leather Restoration

The biggest challenge in matching your VDP seats is that they may have used Autolux leather, the softer, higher grade of hide with less discernible grain. It's not easy to find Autolux anymore, but you never know without some research.

Cheers,

Don