*****Need input on a leather conditioner*****

Did they reformulate it recently? I tried it about 3 years ago and although it smelled like leather city (a good thing), it was pretty damn greasy and didn't seem to do anything as far as softening up the leather.

No products have and I've tried most and some of the strangest. I guess 1Z and LM are next up.

I think the whole leather-care business is ass deep in sham. Too much marketing and not enough science. In fact precious little to no science. I've researched the crap out of this and that has led me to the National Archives (where they have leather stuff they desperately want to preserve) to the Leather Institute in England which seems like a good ol boy club.

No one getting down to the cellar level - doing hard science.

I'm beginning to view leather care like woman's skin care products. Very similar in fact. I've even tried skin care products on leather.

Ya, I'm pretty disgusted with the whole business.

 

hmmm well 1Z actually does soften my leather quite a bit....

 

[I think the whole leather-care business is ass deep in sham. Too much marketing and not enough science. In fact precious little to no science. I've researched the crap out of this and that has led me to the National Archives (where they have leather stuff they desperately want to preserve) to the Leather Institute in England which seems like a good ol boy club.]

One of the reason that I put together this article "Automotive Leather Care" in the detailing school section

 

I appreciate your work. However, there are some unanswered questions. On unprotected spray dyed (opposed to vat dried which hasn't happened in 30+ years) leathers... We're talking high-end non-plastic covered leather - you mention what is said everywhere.

The spray-on coloring natural leather goes through is a pretty effective barrier to water based hydration products. Like I said, I'll be calling Phil to order up LM as that seems to be the gold standard. But I've tried many of these including Leatherique, Griot's, Lexol and others with very limited success on older leather that didn't drive off the showroom floor in the last few years.

For me, I suppose this is a little more pressing that someone looking to spiff up the 08 Beemer. Face it, you can abuse the crap out of just about any leather for a 10 years before you've got a real problem. My leathers are over 20 years old. Leather tends to shrink over a couple of decades, placing stress on hard folds (where stitching is), side and thigh bolsters. These stresses lead to cracks and then a split. I lost a nice seat at a seam when a "hefty" person sat in it. The Ferrari guys I know just suck it up on their vintage cars and a 5-10K re-skin is not a tough call on a '66 330GT that rings out at $100K. If you've got a pre 90's non-supercar Jag/M-B/BMW/Peugeot/Alfa/Citroen, etc, you just live with trashed leather.

Leather restoring isn't something that happens on new cars. "Rejuvinators", "Conditioners", etc. which promise this with flowery prose have left me "hard" on the subject. To cut to the brass tacks - any idiot can make their new leather look nice because new leather IS nice. If you are old and were the smart guy who drove the car off the lot in 77 and gently cleaned & hydrated it every 45 days since, then it still might look nice. But there is an unsolved issue with deterioration and hydration on old leather - your yeoman's article notwithstanding.