I was wondering if anyone has used a leather repair kit on their seats or backrest. Noticed yesterday a little rip on my backrest. I really don't want to buy a new pad, just try to repair it.

 

I've never used a repair kit personally, but have had repairs to leather done by upholstery repairs people that work with local dealers and car lots. They have been able to match color and texture fairly well and the price was reasonable.

If you are comfortable doing that kind of work yourself, give it a shot. But if this is your first time doing this, I'd try a test repair on something before working on the actual backrest. And if it's in an inconspicuous location, it may not need to be perfect. Worse case scenario is you could have an upholstery shop recover the backrest.

Paul

 

Is it real leather or is it the vinyl covering?

Try going to a hobby shop and pick up some material. They usually have any material in any color you could imagine. Then re-cover the piece yourself. Search Youtube for motorcycle seat re-covering, there are tons of videos on how to do it and it looks simple enough.

 

i think you would be better served by removing the covering and repair from the back side. you could use super glue and a strong backing material. from the front, try and close the rip as close as you can and hold with packing tape. then take your backing material and apply super glue or a fabric glue to it and then position it over the rip on the back side, after drying, remove the packing tape. if there is a small crack line, you might find some filler from an online leather supply store or local vendor. frontal repairs are less likely to hold up.

 

https://tandyleather.com

 

I have a 16 foot long Python skin I'll sell ya. You could cover your seat and saddle bags with that LOL.

 

Harley seats are vinyl over fabric. They are not real leather.