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[Glades Cat]

Hello folks,
Another new guy here about to tackle my first upholstery challenge. My grandma taught me how to cook and work a sewing machine and grandpa taught me how to work and fix things. It’s good learning how to do a wide variety of things and I thank them.
I built my last airboat, back in 2009, and had the seats upholstered by a shop. They were nice, but now falling apart. The seat covers/cushions go over fiberglass seats and take a beating in the hot Florida sun.
I have a Husqvarna/Viking Sapphire 875 quilting machine and will be using it to sew the seats. There won’t be any fancy patterns or designs, just seams.
Anyway, thanks for letting me be on this forum and to the great folks on here. Who knows...I may end up buying a walking foot machine, after going down this Rabbit hole a bit. Lol

[Glades Cat]

Here is the single seat front.

[TedP]

Welcome

Lots of folks here to offer advise. I'm not sure how good a machine you have for vinyl upholstery work, but it should be OK. A walking foot machine, as you mentioned, may be the way to go. But . . . if it is a matter of getting through 1 or 2 seats it will probably be OK.

I'm fairly new at this sort of stuff myself and have taken on some big projects. I am currently re-making all of the upholstery and trim on a new-to-me boat. . . . 39 pieces total

I recommend getting some spare vinyl and practice making some stuff. Those seats don't look too difficult, but there are always a few tight spots on any seat, I've found.

Before you tear the vinyl panels apart, make sure to add a bunch of alignment marks and mark the seams (A-A, B-B, etc .), so you will have a good reference when sewing the new vinyl together. Take a bunch of pictures of the seat/vinyl beforehand, so you can refer to them as needed. Since some of your panels are really deteriorated, you may have to improvise on making the new panels.

Are you going to replicate the embroidery? You probably could if you wanted to by sending the vinyl panel out to an embroidery shop. Maybe your machine could do it as well ???

Buy the best vinyl you can and use a 'lifetime' thread (Tenara, Solarfix, etc.) . I see snaps on the seating as well. Get the expensive snap tool . . . I got the cheaper 'visegrip' style tool and it was useless. Ended up buying the pricier C-clamp style tool and all was good. Make sure to get the stainless steel snaps . . . don't try to save money on materials, you are already saving money on labor (hopefully).