Any ideas on how much to reupholster my front seats? Live in NY. Any shop recommendations? Thanks...

 

Can't answer you question directly as to cost but their are some places that sell original (Paul's Jags in Florida) or make good reproductions (Autoberry or BAS).

 

As said, there are a few places (already named) that sell the covers, but I would hate to think of how much $ an upholstery shop would charge to fit them. I imagine it would be at least as much as the covers themselves. If anyone has had these professionally fitted, I'd love to know how much it cost. It took me 32 hours in total to do my 2 fronts. Admittedly I am not an upholsterer, but most of the time was actually disassembling and reassembling the seats. I imagine I would get better at it over time, but if your upholsterer hasn't done XJS seats before, he may also have somewhat of a learning curve.

I seriously considered changing the seats completely to a set of very nice aftermarket leather seats as I don't find the XJS seats very comfortable, but it wasn't going to be easy to keep the seat electrics, memory and seat heaters, and also I don't generally like the word "aftermarket" in the same sentence as my XJS :-)

 

As for all you other questions I suggest searching here and Jaglovers. Won't give you prices but will give you a lot of information. Have you downloaded the Kirby book yet (linked in the faq sticky).

 

I am currently looking at re-upholstering my front seats as well. As I am trying to keep the car as original as possible, replacing the complete seats with aftermarket seats is out of the question. They are not your new BMW seats (VERY nice in my 2011 BMW X3), but they were comfortable enough for me when driving the car 1427 miles in 28 hours.

By having it done by a local upholstery shop there is a good chance that they will not match the color as good as others.

Here is what I found out so far:

gahh.com: $2109.00 for the seats (just the front), they do sell armrest ($138.00), carpet kit ($908.00) and extra vinyl and leather material. I am waiting for the samples.

worlduph.com: $1450.00 for the seats, armrest $85.00 (may not have it, but they can send you the leather), carpet set $600.00. The sample looks good in good quality. I found them to be very friendly and knowledgeable.

autoberry.com: $750.00 for the front seats. I have not asked for the armrest; they do not carry the carpet kit (soon to come). The sample I received was substantially thinner and did not have the normal leather grain, it is as smooth as vinyl (it is not). I talked to the Manager David who was very helpful.

basjaguartrim.com: I called all last week at different times - only the answering machine answered. I left a message, nobody returned my call. I sent them a eMail yesterday as my last attempt.

All prices are for leather - the only way to go in my opinion.

Keep the thread alive as I am interesting in what your experiences are.

 

ive got Cobra race buckets so..... cant help ya there.

 

There is a firm, Black Country Jaguars in England who have bought the entire remaining Jaguar stock of seats for the XJS. These are all the original remaining factory made items. A container full, apparently. They are on UK Ebay (eBay - one of the UK's largest shopping destinations) and you can google them and telephone too. I have no affiliations, but I bought various bits from them for my rebuild, and they were very helpful and extremely fairly priced. Less per seat, than the prices quoted on this thread, as far as I can tell from looking at ebay. Also you help the old country too in these hard times! Greg

 

I have the two front seat skins from Autoberry for my 95 sitting in a box at home. I paid 900.00 because I asked for an upgrade on the leather seats.

I have not installed them yet because I ordered barley and my OEM seats are cream, so I need to get the rest of the trim and the rear seats re-dyed to match.

My 95 came with a lot (mostly) ambla interior (Jaguar's fake leatherette), so I have no point of comparison, but I am very happy with both the quality and price of the Autoberry skins. The pattern is correct and identical for the 95 including those pockets we have on the front of the seats

 

Looking at the cost I do believe I will spend a few more hours of elbow grease to bring my seats back.

 

I wish elbow grease could have turned the ambla into real leather.

 

I spent last Friday working on my seats. They were really grimy.
I took simple dishsoap in a bowl, added water at high pressure and got good suds.
All I used to clean them was the suds...no water. Worked beautifully. (I used that on my very first car when I was 16. If it fixed that it'll work on anything).

Then I took some leather conditioner to it.

The interior was essentially embedded with blackish dirt. Looks pretty dang good now, IMO.

 

I'm actually working on that right now. Found a shop with a great rep. Waiting on a price.
I'm in Buffalo. Where re you?