Thread: staining on almond leather

What a con job, an extra grand for leather protection!! Do they sell this with rust protection upgrade or deep gloss paint protection? Man, this ought to be part of the package when you buy the car, considering how much they cost!
Re.Leather protection: I bought Auto Glym leather balm from Autobahn and it works great on the black leather. It's got the Queens Royal seal of approval, plus Maserati, BWM and others. Don't know how it goes on Almond leather, but is white in colour and buffs in nicely. Don't know if it resists stains however.
Cheers Neil.

Originally Posted by HedleyLamar

What a con job, an extra grand for leather protection!! Do they sell this with rust protection upgrade or deep gloss paint protection? Man, this ought to be part of the package when you buy the car, considering how much they cost!
Re.Leather protection: I bought Auto Glym leather balm from Autobahn and it works great on the black leather. It's got the Queens Royal seal of approval, plus Maserati, BWM and others. Don't know how it goes on Almond leather, but is white in colour and buffs in nicely. Don't know if it resists stains however.
Cheers Neil.

Neil, I use the leather treatment for Jaguar seats, purchased from ULR Malvern.
Best I have used so far.
Cheers, Craig

Just remember one of the worse thing for staining leather is jeans, blue and black ones
They will leave a stain you can't get out


Sent from my iPhone

Originally Posted by Reads90

Just remember one of the worse thing for staining leather is jeans, blue and black ones
They will leave a stain you can't get out


Sent from my iPhone

I will back that statement up...

However the seats do clean up pretty easy with a good quality leather cleaner.

Both my D2a and D3 have the almond leather and it is a struggle to keep it looking good. As it gets older it loses its original colour and starts to look far older then black no matter what you do.

At least you have the car from new so whether it stays looking good and for how long will be up to you.

cheers,
Terry

my Disco 4,

Drive it in the dirt a few times, put a few scratches on it, a couple of shopping trolley hits and in no time you will not be that worried about the leather.

But seriously, I went the black because of young kids, outdoor stuff, low desire to clean regularly etc but so far everything has come off or out, still looks great and I have had no treatments, used no specific leather polish etc.

The leather conditioner is a complete and utter bottom line filler for dealers IMHO as are a lot of the after sales services offered.

Enjoy the new drive and welcome to the forum.

George

OK, so I am the dill. I purchased the stealer package of paint protection, tinted windows and leather protection when my D3 was new a bit over 3 years ago. And I have almond coloured leather, although I think it was called something else then.

As for durability, the leather cleans really easily with a damp rag very occasionally and still looks like new. Same with the paint. And yes it does leave the carport and spends much of its time getting hot and dirty in the WA sun.

SWMBO also has light coloured leather in a SAAB 9-3 wagon which was also "stealer treated" when new. It is about 5 years old and has survived kids and a large dog and still looks like new too.

So for me, I am happy with the leather treatment. Just remember: "the quality is remembered long after the price is forgotten". Oh - and do whatever keeps SWMBO happy.

I bought the opposite - 2.7l D4 White body with Black leather. I was also offered the full dealer treatment, but was shocked at the $2800 asking price - they later rang & offered $2500 - still too high.
Anyway, when I was picking up the car I noticed a Tint-A-Car van outback, so I rang them direct and was offered a similar treatment package (Tint, Leather & Paint) for approx $1000. In the end my local Tint-Mart dealer provided the entire package for $700. The leather seems much softer (the guy reckoned the seats soaked up the treatment). The biggest improvement was with the paint protection. The first couple of times I washed the car before the treatment, I was struggling to remove the bugs, tar etc. However, after the treatment everything cleans off much easier. Also, if you get the windows tinted, make sure the 2 rear side windows aren’t done in a metal film as this can apparently effect the aerial. The Tint-Mart guys advised this, and was confirmed when I rang the LR dealer. They used a dye film instead on these two windows.
I’m not sure if the quality is as good as the LR package, but they were going to charge over $600 just to tint the windows, so I still think I am ahead.