Greetings, I am a new RAV4 owner. Just purchased a demo 2014 XLE and like the car, but am looking to make a few changes.
I have ordered a homelink mirror from ebay and believe I have found what I need on this forum to help me with that install- thanks!
I also purchased a Katskinz black leather kit for 430 shipped from ebay and intend to install myself. I have found enough online help that I feel comfortable doing the seating areas.
My question is with the door panels. Does anyone on this site have experience with swapping out the fabric from the door panels with leather or vinyl? If yes any tips are appreciated.
I'll take some pics of my project and post a write up later.
Welcome to the forum. Good luck with your projects. Unfortunately I have no experence with any of your mods but there usually is someone out there who can assist you.
I'm thinking of doing the katzkin as well. Please do the write up when you get a chance. The door panels are easy to take off. The panel inserts are probably fused in by the outer perimeter. A dremel tool should be able to break those free. Yourautotrim has a good high temp rated spray glue. Probably best to peel off the fabric, spray then install the new material.
My only question is how do these replacement covers accommodate seats with built-in airbags? Is the leather treated or designed to be weaker, or is thinner leather used in airbag areas, so that if an airbag deploys, it is able to beak through?
Whipaway, the following is copied from the katskinz website regarding the airbag issue.
HOW WILL MY NEW LEATHER INTERIOR AFFECT MY AIRBAG AND OCS SYSTEMS?
We perform a detailed inspection of each seat and our interiors are designed to maintain the integrity of the original airbag and OCS systems. We also perform ongoing safety testing using OEM factory specifications to ensure we continue to meet all factory requirements.
I have completed the install of leather seats and seat heaters in my 2014 RAV4 XLE. I worked by myself for the majority of this project with some help from my son on occasion.
I did learn one important lesson. Make sure you buy from a reputable dealer. The Katzkin leather I purchased turned out to be Pecca leather. The seller apologized for the typo. This was my first install attempt so I have little to compare it to other than to say that some of the fasteners did not appear to be of equivalent quality to the seat cover material that I removed. However, I am satisfied with the result.
The install took me 4 days, not full days, but still a lot of time. I also installed seat heaters, a dual USB power outlet for the rear seats and put in some sound insulation material while I had the doors apart.
I apologize for the crappy cell phone pictures. I should have pulled my better camera out.
The first thing I did was to disconnect the battery.
Then I removed the plastic covers hiding the bolts the seat are attached to the floor with. Each front seat had a total of (4) 14mm bolts to remove.
Once the bolts were removed, I removed the headrest and tilted the seats back to unplug the electrical connections under the seats.
Once that was accomplished I carefully removed the seats from the car and took them inside to work on.
The lever for the lumbar support was removed by unscrewing the phillips head screw.
The other plastic lever can be removed from the inside by releasing the tab and sliding it off.
The plastic trim on the bottom, I believe I removed with nylon pry bars- I bought a set of (4) at Menards for 7.99.
Once all the plastic trim was removed from the bottom, I started removing clips and snipping out hog rings.
AFter the cloth seating material was removed, I then use needle nose pliers to remove the remaining pieces of hog rings left in the seat. I do not own hog ring pliers so I used zip ties to put the leather on. If I had to do this over again, I would have purchased the hog ring pliers and hog rings.
I placed the zip ties in the seat and laid down the seat heating material next. I purchased the seat heaters from Ebay and cut the pad to allow for access to the zip ties.
I ran the power cables for the seat heaters to the back and underneath the seat.
After that I attached the leather seating material to the seat using the attached connectors and zip ties. This took some time time to keep it straight and to keep the seams tucked in. I did use some steam to help stretch the material a few times.
Once the leather was on, I cut the top so the headrests could be reattached. I think I should have covered the plastic with tape before putting the leather on to help protect from scratches. This part I did as carefully as possible. Then I used a nylon tool to spread the cut over the plastic piece and to tuck it under. I made the cut smaller than I thought it really needed and stretched it to slide over.
Once that was done I covered the headrests and installed the seat back into the car, then the headrest.
I did take apart the center console and ran wires using an add a circuit busmann connector to tap into the fuse panel under the driver's side of the dash. I found a bolt under the carpet to attach the ground for the seat heater and ran separate power to each unit. I knocked out two of the place holders and installed the switches. The seat heaters work fine.
I also used another add a circuit to run power to a dual USB hub for the back seat. Both kids have tablets and phones that this can power. I had to drill a 1 & 1/8th inch hole in the back cover of the center console to install the usb power. I paid 9 bucks for the usb and about 6 dollars for each add a circuit.
I also took the time to vacuum the carpet when the seats were out.
Next I removed the rear seats. If I would have had more help or if I didn't need to drive the car during the 4 days, I would have removed all of the seats at once.
The rear seats came out as 2 pieces. Each piece had 2 screws in the front under a plastic cover and 3 screws in the back, see the photo of the bolt pattern in the floor.
Once the bolts were out, I removed the headrests and then removed the seat. After that, unclipping the retaining clips and cutting more hog rings was completed. I did cheat and use a 14 inch pair of bolt cutters. It made removing the hog rings much easier and it was easy to use.
I removed a bolt from the metal bracket on the side of the rear seat and will continue in the next post
The plastic lever has a panel that needs to be removed to reveal 3 small screws. Once the crews are removed, the lever comes right off.
The I removed the center arm rest. The plastic drink holder part is held in by clips. I got lucky and pried up from the rear of the cup holder. The front part is held in by a plastic clip that rotates down, hard to explain, but if you ever need to remove this part, pry from the back- the section closest to the rear of the vehicle when the arm rest is down.
After that I removed the existing fabric and installed the leather. The headrests in the back do have a button on the side that I had to cut out in the same manner as I did for the headrests. I did try to remove the fabric from the headrests, but it started to come off with the foam attached so I used some spray lubricant on the fabric, steamed the covers and they slid on with some care. The rear seats also have some plastic parts on the bottom that I removed. Again, I pried from the back side of the head rest and they came off fairly easily. For the buttons on the side of the headrest, I used a pry bar before putting the leather cover on and I pushed the fabric down around the the plastic ring to make room for the new material.
I repeated the same process for the remaining smaller rear seat.
Next it was on to the door panels. I used a pdf provided on this site by buerkletucson to help me get the panels off. Thanks Brian!
There are 3 screws that need to be removed and some clips to be popped. Removing the door panels was actually fairly easy. The easy to see shiny screws in the last photo do not need to be removed. Use a flashlight if you need to see down into the area the screws are located in. I used a nylon pry bar to get the the plastic covers off to expose the screws. I did have to use a small screwdriver on the silver plastic at the bottom to get enough room for the pry bar.
Can you take photo of the replaced door trims please? very interested to see what it looks like on yours! One thing that I am a lil bit uncomfortable with is the door trip where I rest my elbow, I find the cloth rubs too much on my elbow.
Then I removed to plastic panel with the power switch, again used the nylon pry bar and disconnected the power that was plugged in to the bottom.
I used the tool shown in photo 3 to pop the clips. I bought it at harbor freight for 8 bucks. It worked great. I did have a few clips that were left in the door frame and I removed them with a second pass and placed them back into the door panel. Each retaining clip has a small rubber washer that falls off easily. I picked them up and reused them. No clips broke while taking the door panel off.
The front door panels do have an extra plastic piece to remove near the mirror. This part came off very easily with the nylon pry bar.
The door latch, not sure what to call it, can be seen in the photo of the door frame hanging there by some cables. The cables are attached to the door with plastic clips. They are easily removed from the plastic clips then I wiggled the latch out from the panel.
The plastic covering the metal door frame can be lifted up by applying some light heat (warm sun maybe, or a little heat gun, not much heat was needed) and pressure pulling up. The black sticky stuff loosened and the plastic lifted out of the way without tearing. This gave me access to apply some sound insulation. I used some instant roof material I picked up at Home Depot. It was easy to apply and seemed to stick well. I also used the roofing material under the spare tire. I used 2 rolls in total.
Once the panel was out I removed the insulation covering the white plastic piece that holds the fabric. There are two small screws, a clip and several plastic welds that hold the panel in place. I do not have a plastic welder so I very carefully drilled out the welds and later replaced them with hot glue. If going this route, be very careful as the door panels are thin and could be easily drilled through.
Once the panel was out I used spray glue Loctite professional on the fabric and the back of the material I was using as a cover. I spent a lot of time carefully rolling out the fabric, pressing it into place and trimming it. Do not remove the fabric that is on the plastic door panel as it will remove the foam behind it. I guess you would be OK to do so if your material had an 1/8th of an inch of foam backing to it.
Then I reinstalled the panels.
The job is not perfect, but i am satisfied. How well the hot glue and zip ties hold up, I will find out in time.
Also, FWIW, I don't notice much difference with the extra sound insulation. The speakers sound differently and I have the volume a little lower at highway speeds.
that looks good and you did the work yourself...i know its tons of work doing upholstery swaps. i recently missed out on a whole tan leather katzkin set for 200, feel so dumb for just not getting it.
i added a power inverter to the back of the center console so the usb and ac outlet are pointing towards the roof...i was thinking of adding another 12v/usb like the way you did but the way plugs will stick out could be kicked by a passenger making the outlets real loose. no offense to my lovely wife but its something she'd totally do XD