Also look at Krist Kustoms. Shawn will sell you the seat frame or the seat frame with foam. CLICK HERE

 

Thanks Dan
I looked at their products but I don't see a fold down arm rest; I gotta have my arm rest.

 

I've personally never used Wiseguy, but a friend of mine did and he absolutely loved it. Sorry couldn't be more help!!

 

It really depends on what style you like. Do you like a seat that looks like a Motorhome seat that the covers fit loosely, or do you prefer a seat that is like a properly made Army Cot, you drop a quarter on it and it jumps back up, because the cover is tight.
I am currently building a set of Wiseguys bucket seats for a customer. The frames are good quality. IMHO, the foam is lacking a little in quality and style. If you look very closely at the seats on their website you will notice that every seat has wrinkles in it. This is due to their foam design. I have about 12 hours in redoing the foam package so that I can get the cover to fit tightly and without wrinkles. Some people like this look, it does not make them a bad seat, I personally want my cover to fit like a glove. If you are going to order one already covered by wiseguys, I can tell you that it will have the wrinkled look. Have you looked at Tea's Designs? They make very high quality seats and they do offer armrests. www.teasdesigns.com

Tim

 

Thanks for the suggestion and link Tim. That's the reason I posted this. I agree with you on the wrinkles. I noticed this on their website. I wonder if a good upholstery guy can pull them tight enough to get the wrinkles out.

That link won't get it. Try: http://www.teasdesign.com/product/

 

Checked out Teas and was a bit disappointed. I didn't see how they made the seats, whether they used plywood or steel framing. Also the arm rests were a bit small for my taste. The seats looked really nice tho.

 

I agree with you on the wrinkles. I noticed this on their website. I wonder if a good upholstery guy can pull them tight enough to get the wrinkles out.

I think most upholsterers will agree that at least 80% of the final look of the seat is due to the skill of the upholsterer. On the other hand, having a really good base, including what fabric you pick, and the quality of the seat foam is important too, as Tim pointed out. There is more to upholstery than just being able to copy the old seat covers.
This is why I will never go over the old seat padding, especially on a bench seat, if the padding is substandard in any way. I also encourage my customers to choose fabrics (or leather) that I know will make a great looking seat.
We are blessed these days with vinyls, 100% polyurethanes, and leathers that are far superior to what was used when your old car was new, and make great looking seats.

 

Check out these Wiseguys seats covered by Krist Kustoms. Krist does some pretty nice work. He still got some wrinkles in his seats. These are the exact same seats that my customer purchased and gave to me to cover. The Bolster design makes it near impossible to make the cover wrinkle free.

http://www.kristkustoms.com/gallery eleven/FrameSet.htm

 

Check out these Wiseguys seats covered by Krist Kustoms. These are the exact same seats that my customer purchased and gave to me to cover. The Bolster design makes it near impossible to make the cover wrinkle free.

Are the bolsters really soft or what? There's many schools of thought on seat foam. Some like it really soft and some like it really hard. Naturally it's a lot easier to use hard foam to push the seat covers out, but adding more foam to what's there can do the same thing. I personally don't want the seat to look and sit like a brick. If that means some tiny wrinkles, that's O.K. with me. Just sitting on the seat over the course of time will put in some wrinkles. Over time, the seat cover can't possibly stay the way it looked when it was just finished.

 

Dan,
The bolsters are not radiused on the edges. They are all cut flat with a chiseled look, especially on the ends (picture a close up of a cut diamond). Unless you sew 3 or 4 pcs for each bolster, the cover can't lay over the bolster. The design creates alot of voids that the fabric can't contour to. The seating foam is not bad, but the bolster foam could be a little firmer. My fear is that the bolsters will lose their shape fairly quickly.
Tim

 

If you sew all the pieces of your seat covers to sew foam, you won't have any problems. I sew the tops of the seats to 1/2" sew foam, and the perimeter pieces to 1/4" sew foam.

 

Dan,
I fully understand using sew foam with the fabric. I am an upholsterer by trade. I was trying to give my point of view to Chevy3600 as to the quality of the wiseguys seats. IMHO, the way the seats are designed makes it almost impossible to get the cover on tight. Everyone has their own opinion on how the seat should look when finished. I just prefer a tighter cover than what the wiseguys seats allow you to make without some modifications. Thanks for the tip.
By the way, how do you add pictures?? Searched the forum, but could not come up with the answer.

Tim

 

To add pictures to your posts, after you click on "post reply" go to the next screen down below the "reply to thread" screen called "additional options" and go to the area that says "attach files". ( Your pictures are limited to 300 KB each, so you have to re-size them first with whatever photo program you use on your computer.) Click on "manage attachments", and a screen opens up to let you upload 5 pictures. Click on "browse", find the picture on your computer and open it, and that will let you attach a picture. You can also download pictures directly into your messages from a web site like Photo Bucket by using the link icon just above the message screen. (it's the one that looks like a globe with two chain links below it)

BTW, I agree that the seat covers on the finished Wiseguys seats on their web site are not very well tailored.