Best method of cleaning cloth seats

[SmutsGTI]

Hey guys,

Selling my wife's MkV, she has a light grey back seat and it is a little grimey ( just surface dirt and water stains ) what's the best method of getting the stains out. My panel beater recommends just a little bit of regular soap on a damp sponge and rub lightly.

Any advice would be fantastic.

Cheers

Smuts

[99gti]

Go and hire one of those britex machines from woolies and do your house at the same time.

They will bring them up like brand new again.

[DMS_Dan]

Yep that works well and is quite easy. Or you can do the following

1. mix up some solution. Use a general purpose cleaner or a carpet shampoo.
2. dip a microfiber in this solution and lightly wring out. You want it still wet.
3. Prepare 2 buckets of clean water and have a wet microfiber in one bucket.
4. Using the solution soaked microfiber rub all over the seats. You will see the cloth changing colour. You can rinse it in the bucket of clean water then dip it in the solution and start again.
5. Once you are happy the seats are clean use the mf from the clean water and rub the seats again to rinse. Do this till there is no foam on the seats.
6. Using another mf or a towel dry the seats. This process is accelerated with a heat gun or hairdryer (dont get to close or you will burn the fabric) or by parking the car in the sun.
7. Clean seats!!

[88CABBY]

Hey what i did, i got a spray bottle and mixed oxi clean and water got a CLEAN cloth and sprayed the cloth NOT DIRECTLY on the seat.... then scrubbed it then vacummed it..... so now i i got a set of cheap seat covers and they are CLEAN.....

[SmutsGTI]

Thanks DMS i'll use your method seeing you have the qualifications!.

I'll let you know how it goes

Cheers

Smuts!

[DMS_Dan]

Dont write off Niels idea mate. His way will be much quicker, the only advantage to mine is you probably have the stuff round the house already. With the machine you can do all the carpets as well

[SmutsGTI]

I'll use that if your method fails, i'd rather not pump to much water etc into the seat if possible.

Cheers

Smuts

[limmy]

not sure how similar mk5 seats are like compared to mk4.

but when lifting up the seats in my old mk4, i was able to dig my fingers between the cloth and seat padding from underneath and release clips all the way around.

from here, there were metal pieces (like thickness of a coathanger) which ran along the depth of the seat and lodged into little slots. this was the most difficult to pull apart, but got the hang of it after a few.

after pulling it apart, i chucked the seat covers into the bathtub with lukewarm water, small amount of laundry detergent and hand scrubbed. rinse well and leave to dry in the shade. minimises risk of material shrinking.

managed to get my dogs spew stains off the seat, and it came up brand new!