We all love the luxurious look and feel of our leather car seats but at the same time, we need to ensure the safety of our underaged passengers. So how do you protect your leather car seats from child car seats so they don’t get ugly scratches, creases, dents, and or scuffs?
- Let An Expert Install Your Child Car Seats
- Using A Car Seat Protector
- Regular Cleaning, and Conditioning
- Use Shelf Liner Paper
- Throw On Some Mats
- Put A Towel Under Your Child Seat
The above are 6 best ways to protect your car leather seats from your child seats. There’s more to learn about protecting leather car seats from child seats. Keep reading to find out more!
1. Let An Expert Install Your Child Car Seats
If you really do not want the child car seats you intend installing to mar or cause any form of damage to your fine leather car seats, then allow a professional upholsterer to do the installation for you.
The most obvious reason why you would want a professional on this is the fact that they will at least know what they’re doing.
Plus this is also going to save you a bunch of time trying to figure out what goes where and whether or not a particular placement is safe for your leather car seats or not.
The expert installation is going to ensure your child’s seat is secured and of the right tightness required to avoid slips and scratches which will build up to damage the surface of your leather car seat.
Another important thing any expert who installs your child seats will ensure is that the seat is right for the weight of your child.
If this is not done and a child seat carries too much weight contrary to what it’s built to take or carry, it’s a recipe for disaster for your car leather seats.
What’s going to happen is that it will build pressure on your leather seats and within a matter of days you will see clear markings which will later develop into withering and wear.
One clear way of determining whether a child seat is well installed or otherwise is when it wobbles. The wobbly nature of an installed child seat will in no time destroy your leather seats.
What you would want is a properly installed child seat that will not wobble, non-moving (at least until you want it to), and safely tightened by a professional so that everything remains where it’s supposed to be.
This is one sure way leather car seats will be safe from your child seats.
2. Use A Car Seat Protector
This is another great way to protect leather seats from child seats. Car seat protectors come as durable and easy to use covers which are going to take up all the friction caused by the installed child seats.
It’s going to act as a shield for your leather car seats. Some of these protectors even come with unique waterproof qualities that prevent liquid stains from your child passenger from getting onto your leather car seats as they can build up and wear your leather seat.
There are generally different kinds of leather car seat protectors. There are car seat protectors that will come with normal seats which will only help to protect the portion on the car leather seats where the babysits.
There are others that have an added feature that covers the rest of the leather seats to take care of kids throws and spillages whenever they occur.
Another type of car seat protector which is also my personal favorite is the slide-proof car seat covers.
These are great because they help to prevent scratches which may come as a result of the car seats sliding over the leather car seats causing damage to the surface of leather seats.
3. Throw On Some Mats
Putting up a mat underneath the child seat is also a good way to protect your leather car seats from your child seat installation.
These mats comes in different forms such as non-skid, plastic, canvas, or quilted.
You can either buy them online, from a supply store near you, or you can make them yourself if you’re pretty handy.
The most popular mats you can get if you don’t want to make one yourself are the rubber mats that come rolled up and can be cut to size to fit a particular area where the child seat sits.
Mats are great as they can help prevent the child seat from sliding causing the leather car seats to scratch or dent. They help to keep the child seat in the position its meant to be in.
4. Cleaning And Conditioning
No matter the pressure and friction a child seat may give to your leather car seats, your regular routine cleaning, conditioning, and leaving the leather car seat to properly dry and rest for some time is a sure way to stop any damage it is bound to suffer.
Thoroughly cleaning and conditioning will allow you to clean parts of the leather car seats where you would otherwise not have access.
You would want to take the child safety seats out first before being able to thoroughly clean and condition your leather car seat.
In order to properly clean your car seats, it’s crucial you know what’s in your leather cleaning products or solution.
Also important is how to use these leather cleaning and conditioning products.
Usually, you will find all the necessary information you will need to know about the product such as cleaning agents and its pH levels, conditioning ingredients, such as mink oil, linseed oils, waxes, etc. and how to apply it for optimal results – all on the product package.
Before you clean your leather car seats, it’s important to always vacuum or brush off all dirt and dust from the leather surface and all hard to reach areas around the child seat before you apply your cleaning products.
As far as cleaners go, you will be able to use small amounts of water and vinegar to wipe the leather surface using a microfiber cloth.
Stubborn stains and dirt can be effectively cleaned by spraying a solution of vinegar and water on the leather surface.
After that, the surface of the leather can be buffed using a microfibre cloth.
It’s always best to follow up on your cleaning with conditioning. Conditioning the leather car seat is what will restore the seat’s natural oil back and secure it from child seats friction and pressure.
In conditioning the leather seat, a spot test must be done to check whether the conditioner you opted for will fit your leather and will not discolor or damage the leather.
If you’re sure of the leather conditioner after testing you will then rub the leather conditioner on the leather surface carefully without oversaturating the leather surface.
And after the leather car seat is thoroughly cleaned and conditioned, it’s important to allow it to sit and rest for a couple of hours for all the marks that the child seat might have created to completely disappear or significantly diminish.
A little related side note, leather conditioners with wax and petroleum contents may make your leather car seats sticky and may not necessarily give you the finish you will want to get after conditioning.
So you would want to avoid conditioners free from those two ingredients.
5. Use Shelf Liner Paper
The cause of most damages caused by child seats on leather car seat surfaces is the wrinkles and indentations on the edges of child seats left on the surface of leather car seats.
This is where the use of Shelf Liner Papers becomes relevant as it will help soften the sharp marks which will be caused by the child seats on the leather car seats.
Shelf Liner Papers too can help your child seat to sit permanently well on the leather car seats and the sliding and the movements of the child seat which can cause damages to leather car seats will be prevented.
If you still want to use a seat protector, you can use it and after that place your Shelf Liner Paper on it. This will protect your leather car seat from child seats.
6. Put A Towel Under Your Child Seat
Fixing a towel under your child seat is probably the easiest and cheapest way of protecting your leather car seats from your child safety seats.
This method is great if you can’t afford or wouldn’t want to spend any cash protecting your leather car seats.
I can understand how little things add up so quickly and before you say jack, your check out basket will be breaking the bank.
So you will be able to make this method work for you no matter the kind of safety seat you have installed.
The towel method is particularly ideal if the towel you use is quite thick. It will be able to provide you with almost the same level of security a leather car seat protector will offer you.
While this may work for your leather car seats perfectly, it will, however, not give you the long-term use a leather car seat protector will give you.
As far as safety goes, putting a towel under your child safety seat is safe and won’t cause any problems with the child safety seat installation. So you won’t have to worry about jeopardizing the way the child seat is safely installed.
Pro Tip: Never fold or roll up the towel underneath the child seat otherwise it will compress in case of a crash and may result in some injuries to your beloved child passenger.
So you would always want to keep the towel flat!
How To Remove Seat Marks From Leather Car Seats
If your leather car seats have already been marked or marred by your child’s seats, you can check out this video. It shows you how to safely remove the marks created by the child safety seat installed in your car.
The reality is, whatever dent, crease, or wrinkle you are unable to successfully prevent from happening may be hard to permanently remove.
Usually, you might be able to even out the dent or crease temporarily but will most likely return after a while.
So the key takeaway basically is that you would want to ensure you practice or use the methods highlighted in this post so that you do not get to this point of no return with your leather car seats.
Conclusion
In this article, I showed you 6 easy ways to protect your car leather seats from your child’s seat installation.
These methods are going to a large extent help shield your cars’ fine leather seats from being ruined by the child seat you put up.
The ball is now in your court to actually choose which of the methods will work for you. I hope this article was very useful to you. Thanks for sticking around.