The Upholstery Forum

Hi all. New member here.

I am working on a motorcycle seat that has four buttons installed as tufting decorations in two separate seat cushions. One cushion is for the primary rider and the other is for the passenger. After taking the old upholstery fabric off of the cushioning, I notice there is some sort of orange-ish colored, semi-hard material, about a half inch in diameter, surrounding the button holes in the fabric. It is obviously there to prevent the holes in the fabric from widening or tearing from normal use. It appears as if it may have been melted onto the fabric cloth backing. It will not peel off and it is securely bonded to the fabric material. It sort of feels like some sort of a plastic material.

I would like to use the same material for the replacement fabric coverings for the same reinforcement reasons, however, I have not been able to find out what it is. Can anyone tell me what it is called or maybe a source for the product please?

Thanks in advance.

@H2814D , Your best bet on this forum is to post a picture. Many of us are pretty creative at implimenting an alternative if we cannot find a part.

Here are the Pics. There is one with a close up of what I am trying to find.

Hi @H2814D !! Welcome to the forum!!!!

I have never seen that before. Looks to me like something done at the factory with specialized equipment. Probably won’t be able to reproduce it.

Honestly I’m %99 percent sure you will be fine with out it. I have done button tufting on a few restaurant booths and have never had an issue with the button ripping through. Restaurant seating typically gets more abuse than motorcycles.


Hope that helps!

Thanks for the input, John. I did cut a piece of the same fabric material in a diameter just smaller than the button diameter and have used contact cement to adhere the two faces of the material together. I then punched a hole in the middle of it for the string. It will be on the button side, directly under the button, rather than the underside of the upholstered seat. I will see how that goes.

That should be more than enough to hold up for years to come! Post pictures when you finish! We would love to see the finished product!

Thank again. I hope so. I'll get the pics on here when I'm done.

Ok. All done. Here are the Pics. Understand that this is a first time project for me, so I will take any criticisms and learn from them. Thanks in advance for any of them.

There are some sewing flaws, but once the seats are mounted on the motorcycle, unless you were looking for them, they wouldn't be apparent. Oddly, after doing this project, I now notice myself now looking at other upholstered seats and chairs for flaws.

The pic with the three seat portions next to each other were the originals. I ended up using round pieces of the fabric material contact cemented to the button holes, fabric side to fabric side for the button hole reinforcement. I then punched a hole in the reinforced areas to run the button strings through to the hard plastic seat frame to secure the buttons. I think this will work, based on your suggestions and input so far. Thanks again.

@H2814D ,

Fantastic job! Now ever wonder why gallery photos of peoples work are taken at a distance. We all have flaws anybody can pick out.

Thanks for the compliment.

@H2814D That came out great! You should be proud. Nice job

Thanks John. Yes, they did come out pretty good. I've never even tried anything like this before, but they looked pretty good when I was done. I was shocked. :-) Here is a pic of the final product installed on the motorcycle.

Does that ever look GREAT installed!

Lol! Be careful, now every one in town will want you to do their seats.

This topic has an incredible number of "views." I wonder why? And no, it's not me coming back and looking at it over and over and over again. :-)

wow your right it sure does! I guess its just how the google search algorithms work.