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Diamond tufting?

3K views 6 replies 3 participants last post by  hotmomma52204 
#1 ·
Hi,

I recently joined on here seeing some good advice on diamond tufting for seats. Here is my delimma. I have a customer that wants this done on the headliner of his 2008 dodge quad cab pickup. . . in Naugahyde. However, I can't find any foam that would be thick enough to really pull this off that comes more than 24" wide. I haven't removed the old headliner thinking that maybe I could leave it and add another layer of foam over it then the naugahyde. My fear is this would be to heavy and would fall plus the foam still wouldn't be thick enough to look like more than a piece of material with a bunch of buttons on it. The thickest foam I have found that would be wide enough and long enough is only a 1/4". Help?
 
#2 ·
Tell the guy to forget it. WAY too heavy for practical use. Even if you got the thing to stay up. All it would take is someone to open a window at certain speeds and down it comes. Unless you have it anchored with lag bolts.

You can end bond the sheets of foam. To get larger pieces.
 
#3 · (Edited)
hotmomma52204 said:
Hi,

I recently joined on here seeing some good advice on diamond tufting for seats. Here is my delimma. I have a customer that wants this done on the headliner of his 2008 dodge quad cab pickup. . . in Naugahyde. However, I can't find any foam that would be thick enough to really pull this off that comes more than 24" wide. I haven't removed the old headliner thinking that maybe I could leave it and add another layer of foam over it then the naugahyde. My fear is this would be to heavy and would fall plus the foam still wouldn't be thick enough to look like more than a piece of material with a bunch of buttons on it. The thickest foam I have found that would be wide enough and long enough is only a 1/4". Help?
Then you don't have very good sources available to you for foam. I can get any thickness, any quality, any density, any width, any length from my supplier the next day. To pull this off, and make it look right, you need at least 1" foam in a higher density. 1 1/2" in a slightly softer density would be better. You only need a piece maybe 60" by 72". Tell me what you need in a PM, and I'll have it shipped directly to you. If you have access to 1" or 1 1/2" foam, you could edge-glue it together to make the size you need. Use# 22 buttons (about 1/2" in diameter). Threaded nails or prong buttons would be best. If you can't make these yourself, I can make them for you.

Use the original headliner, mark off the tufting pattern on that, drill 1/8" holes through the headliner, duplicate the pattern on the foam, cut 3/4" to 1" holes through the foam for each hole and tuft. It will never sag or come down, although you may need some extra attaching points for an overhead application. You won't need lag bolts or anything that heavy, the tufting will only add about 5 pounds to the headliner.

Apparently you never lived through the "Custom Van" craze. I did a van that was diamond tufted from one end to the other from halfway up the walls and all across the ceiling. About 500 buttons in a 5" by 7" pattern. My hands still hurt from that one!
 
#5 ·
As an afterthought, know of anywhere that I can get some material at least 60 inches wide? My supplier must be pretty limited cuz they can't get material any wider than 55 that isn't marine. That to me doesn't exactly say high quality. And also this particular headliner has some pretty deep grooves in it where the visors attach. Suggestions on getting wrinkles to dissapear besides heating? The hole seems to deep for that.
 
#6 ·
If you're talking about vinyl 60" wide, I don't know of anybody that has it. The way to take care of the size problem is to cut the vinyl in two pieces whatever size you need in a zig zag pattern where it will be tufted, and sew it together. The tufting will hide the seam in its folds. I would not tuft the area where the visors go.
 
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