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Now for the ultimate moment of truth: installing the seat bottom in the car. Will it fit? Is the new seat foam so thick that it won’t go under the seat back or between the sides of the car? How will it look? Will it collapse as soon as I sit on it? To my surprise – nay, to my amazement! – it...

The initial plan was to cut the new foam about 4″ larger on the front and wrap it down the front to avoid feeling the front of the seat frame. So I did that. After sewing up the seat cover I did a test fit over the naked seat frame and it seemed to fit. Encouraging! Or a setup for calamity… In...

Well this is a milestone! The bottom of the rear seat is done and installed in the car. And it isn’t half bad! The starting point was rough: worn, torn, pleats filled with crumbling foam (and foam powder), and just generally shot. Factory seat cover (which was under the aftermarket seat...

Interesting! It is amazing how many high end features are showing up in affordable tools. PoE testing would really be useful. And if you are working with fibre that would be a lifesaver.

Klein Tools VDV501-851 Cable Tester Kit with Scout Pro 3 for Ethernet / Data, Coax / Video and Phone Cables, 5 Locator Remotes, Yellow is a versatile tool that can measure cable length or length to break. For $100 I think it is a good deal. Much better than the generic $10 or $20 cable checkers.

With the seat backs done next up was the arm rest. You know the drill by now: take the old cover off, take the old cover apart, use the pieces of the old cover to make templates, cut out new pieces, sew them together, and re-install. Like the rest of the seat, the after market cover was...

True. It is amazing how little bandwidth video requires with modern codecs. I (vaguely) remember the days of uncompressed video streams - now there was a bandwidth hog! We're getting down into the weeds here - anyone who isn't a geek feel free to ignore! I'm familiar with UTP and differential...

What is the actual output from the tester?

First, the cable working for 10 years and the tester showing miswire aren't necessarily mutually exclusive. 10Mb and 100Mb Ethernet only use two pairs. Gigabit and above use four pairs. Thus a cable can work fine at 100Mb and fail at Gigabit. Network interfaces normally detect this and slow down...

The secret is practice. The first 50 times you do it the results look like they were done by a drunken squirrel. But after doing it enough times the lines slowly get better and better until they look like they were done by a sober squirrel. This is why I started off just sewing seam after seam...

<Groan!> Thanks! It isn't show car quality, but it is much better than what was there.

The test cover was just that – a test. The actual vinyl is different – heavier and harder to stretch. And the test cover could have been a fluke. One way to find out – stop stalling and make a real seat cover! Drag out the production vinyl, arrange the templates, find the marking tools and...

I'm just annoyed that it was the one thing that I knew couldn't be the problem that was the problem!

Time to bring all of the pieces together (pun intended), make a complete seat cover out of junk vinyl, and see if it actually fits. No, I’m not concerned at all. Nope, nope, nope… Step one: cut out all of the pieces: Step two: sew it together: Step three: find the hog ring pliers and box...

The old seat covers in the Imperial wrap around the back of the seat frame and are secured to the frame with hog rings. The factory sewed cloth extension onto the sides of the seat for this attachment, which made sense when the seats were made of leather. See the gray cloth in the pictures...

That makes sense - thanks!

Swanny, one of the reasons for sharing this Journey is to show that you can learn new things. Skills are something you end up with, not something you start with. I tend to be a bit methodical and deliberate. For something completely new I try to learn and practice the basics before jumping into...

This is a little out of order, but I'll confess my mistakes in the hopes it might help someone else. Having achieved an almost acceptable test panel with the junk vinyl, I decided to make one last test panel. This last test panel would use the actual vinyl I will be using for the seats. I also...

Good point! Of course, in my experience the vinyl wants to gather, pucker, and wrinkle even when the seam lines are the exact same length... But you are right, if they aren't the same length you are doomed before the needle penetrates the fabric.

In an amazing coincidence, my order of M2-M4 screws was also for 3D printing projects! Promptly followed by printing a bunch of bin inserts for Harbor Freight cases - for the small screws 4-6 bin inserts for each Harbor Freight bin works great. I found that it is easy to grab two or three of...