Car leather upholstery is a youthful idea. This sentence is stated by one of the sellers of car covers on Mellat Street, located in S. Saadi Street. He, who installs natural leather and plastic (synthetic leather) covers for the car seats of many of his young customers during the day, says this from his own experience. A group of car owners, especially young people, are willing to pay large sums for the beauty of their car seats. For them, leather car seats and in addition the dashboard, steering wheel and interior of car doors are calming. Therefore, these people are willing to pay a high price to maximize the beauty of these parts of their car.
In 1913, the Aston Martin Automobile Plant started a small workshop in which it used leather, aluminum, gold, etc. to beautify the interiors of its production cars. The interior products of this workshop, which was in London, were completely handmade. This workshop does not use any plastic material in the interior decoration of the car and even uses natural leather, aluminum and gold in the construction of buttons, air conditioning windows, cigarette butts, seats, dashboards, steering wheel and other parts of the car’s interior.
Although the manufacturers of car interior decorations in Iran are not as accurate as Aston Martin, but they are careful in using high quality natural leather, color, and proper leather tread. For some time now, major car manufacturers in Iran, including Irankhodro and Saipa, have been using natural leather for car interior decoration for their special customers. But since the breakdown of these large automotive companies’ relations with leather manufacturers, leather consumption in the automotive industry has declined sharply. But still some car companies use high quality Iranian natural leathers to beautify the interior furniture of their cars at different costs.
In an interview with Dalir leather industry engineers, we will discuss how to use leather in cars.
Fabric and leather cover are different in terms of price and performance. However, some of the fabric covers behind them are made of plastic (synthetic leather). Therefore, few manufacturers use natural leather for car upholstery, because the high cost of production increases the cost of car upholstery, but the antiquity and durability of natural leather is much higher than its synthetic type and also against the sun. It also has a longer shelf life.
According to the young buyers of leather upholstery, it can be acknowledged that the Dalir leather industry has produced all models of natural leather upholstery in all available colors and designs and provided them to consumers. Iranian car covers are often made of plastic (synthetic leather). This is because the price of natural leather is somewhat expensive and fewer manufacturers are willing to use them in their products.
A group of car owners, especially young people, are willing to pay a high price for the beauty of their car furniture. For them, leather car furniture such as seats, dashboards, steering wheel and interior body of doors create peace of mind. These people are willing to have natural and quality leather to pay a lot of money for the interior decoration of their car.
Mr. Shahab Mihandoust, a member of the Iranian Leather Industries Association, says about the use of leather in the automotive industry: “Until two years ago, Iran Khodro and Saipa used to use leather extensively in their custom cars, but recently these types of orders In factories, leather production has declined, and it is not clear whether this is due to declining consumer demand or an increase in the price of leather used in cars, usually car interior manufacturers use cow and calf leather. The country has a small number of them able to pay and place orders for car leather, because the consumption of this type of leather is different from the leather used in the production of shoes, including the companies producing car leather in the country is a Dalir leather industry.
He also said about the difference between the leather of home and car furniture: “In furniture, the amount of wear, thickness and other components of quality and desirability should be considered in production, so in home furniture, the variety of colors and leather treads is different than car. The use of leather coloring in airplanes and cars is more limited and most colors of gray, crimson and black are common in them, but in home furniture there is a variety of natural leather colors due to the difference in the production of leather furniture for home and car, In the process of preparing car leather and home furniture, various chemicals and tests are usually added to the durability and effects of the leather so that the leather reaches the desired by the manufacturers, despite the use of leather by foreigners. In wall covering or interior decoration of the house, less of this type of leather is produced for the consumption of interior decoration of houses in Iran, and if there are cases in Iranian construction, it is mostly supplied through the import of foreign leather.
Mr. Ebadollah Yousefzadeh, a professor and expert in leather and author of books on leather, said about the use of leather in cars: “Before, some leather companies cooperated with Saipa satellite companies. In fact, the reason for this cooperation was that some of these cars were prepared for export to foreign countries, but now these cars are no longer produced, however, the use of leather in cars has increased the price of car interior decoration, and finally similar domestic cars with export cars in terms of price difference. There are some because of the use of leather in interior decoration, in fact, interior cars use less natural leather and use more foam (synthetic leather). On the other hand, some consumers are so obsessed with leather that the steering wheel is also ordered with custom leather.
Today, car interior and seat upholstery are made of cow leather, but in the past, some customers also made this furniture with goat leather, with the difference that they were responsible for cutting the leather themselves and only took custom leather from the factory and the rest. They did the final finishing work on the leather. In such a situation, leather waste would be less for consumers of car covers. Of course, in the production of cow or goat leather in car furniture, mainly leathers that have fewer strokes on the back of the skin are used.
The color of this type of leather also varies according to the order and interest of the customers. Sometimes people even deliver a sample of a special color or tread of leather to the factory and receive the leather case according to the order. The production of this type of leather requires special chemicals. In addition, in accordance with the consumption of leather in home and car furniture, scientific tests should be performed in the leather factory to ensure that the leather in the car is foggy, because during the cold season, the use of leather may cause fog in the car, but this issue is not so important in its home furniture.
Also, for the use of natural leather in the summer in car and home furniture, sweat test is taken so that it does not produce sweat against the wear and body heat of consumers. In addition, the test of leather adhesion to clothing and its negative impact on consumers is tested. The transfer of leather to pvc clothing should also be evaluated. This type of natural leather has a much higher price due to the final payment and testing.
He clarified about the decrease in demand for car leather and wall coverings in Iran: for unknown reasons, the relationship between leather manufacturers and car interior decorations has been cut off due to non-fulfillment of customers’ obligations in due time. Of course, in the field of leather production for interior furniture, the production process continues, but in recent years, leather orders for cars, airplanes and wall coverings have decreased. Although wall coverings are not so popular in Iran, in a few unfortunate cases, hotels or stylish buildings source their raw materials from abroad.
Leather production for cars and home furniture requires new machinery, experienced technicians and special chemicals to increase the durability and quality of the leather produced. Also, the use of leather in car interior decorations usually has an effect between IRR 15 million to 20 million on the price of custom cars. However, using natural leather in the car will double its beauty.
