Porsche Pulled Threads Repair.

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1 Porsche Pulled Threads Repair. 1. The Problem. Lots of us have experienced the driver s left threads pulling at the front of the seat between the side bolster and the center cushion. 2. The solution was suggested by Brad of the 924/944/968 Rennlist list group. His solution reads: I have fixed such problems using what is called a double needle hand stitch. You will need two curved needles that can be found at any sewing supply retailer and a spool of heavy upholstery thread. If you run the tread through a bit of wax and then under a hot iron, it won't tangle up on you. Take about four feet of thread and put a needle on each end. Pull about a foot through each needle. Push one of the needles through an existing hole in the seam, as far back on the seam where the thread is still holding it together. Use too much force here and you will split the seam even more. You need to be gentle. Pull the needle through until you have equal length of thread on each side. Now you move to the next set of holes, the needles pass each other from opposite directions, forming the stitch. Do not pull the thread tight. You need the looseness to stay in there and work. As you get near the end of the tear, it gets harder to get the needle where you need to be. Ending the stitch requires pulling all the loose thread tight, this will pull the seam together. Tie a couple good knots in your thread and snip off the extra. The smaller the needles, the easier it is to work with, too small and you can't get the thread in them. Have a couple extras, so when you break one you can go on.

2 If you do break one, make sure you get all the pieces, you don't want one sneaking up on you going down the road. A good pair of (grippers/pliers) is a must. This will not be easy if the leather has ripped, but can be done if the leather is intact and only the old thread has let go. Good luck. 3. To start the project you first need to gather some tools: a. Smaller curved needles and some heavy polyester thread. b. A good light. c. Good eyes

3 d. And a pair of grippers and a glass of wine. 4. The first step is to thread cut about four feet of thread and then thread a curved needle onto each end with about twelve inches of thread pulled through each needle. 5. Next you start from one end of the pull but within an area of good threads. You will use one needle to thread through a hole going towards the good area and come out at the next thread hold then continue through the matching hole and then back through the hole in the direction you will be sewing in. Note that this is just the beginning loop and is the foundation of all the work to come. I made sure that I lay all the threads out carefully after I was through so that I wouldn t end up getting the in a mess.

4 6. Now you do a back and forth sewing so that each needle passes through the same hole that the needle from the other side passes through. Sounds crazy but it turns out to be quite easy to do. There are a couple of things to be careful of. A) you do not want to pull the threads tight yet; B) you need to be VERY careful not to hook a needle through the thread in the hole that it is passing through; and C) you should remove any damaged thread before you begin. Below are a couple of photos of the process. 7. After continuing to thread back and forth, you will reach a point that you are sewing into an area of good stitching. Now with a thread coming out of a hole on each side IN THE GOOD STITCHING AREA you are now ready to begin tightening up the threads. First I am sorry but with only one set of hands I was able to get no photos of the process of tightening. You DO want to be patient, slow moving, and willing NOT to pull for all it is worth with each step in tightening. What you want to do is to take another set of curved needles and use them to pull the stitches tighter from the beginning end towards the end where the threads are coming out. Start at the original loop end and pull up on a pair of threads (not the 1 st loop, though) and as you hold that tight, pull up the next pair of threads pulling the tightened loop from the first set, etc., etc. all the way down the chain until you

5 can pull/tighten the threads coming out to the needles. Now this process will take you a bit of time but if you are patient, you will be rewarded by the two seams pulling together. This can be a bit frustrating because this area of the seat is naturally pulling away (is this why the threads break here???). Be VERY careful and don t jerk because you can break the threads and then you will have to start over. 8. Now that you have it tight you are almost home free! Now take the needles and loop back in the original direction. Now this is where some of you upholstery folks can make some additions but I just looped back and forth a couple of times and tied blind knots and then pulled the thread through the seams so that it couldn t be seen. Anyway, the results are below.