Can anyone show me the cloth seats from a 1988?

[doity]

Want to see what it looks like.  Also, does anyone know a provider of high quality velour seat covers that would fit a 88' Reatta.  Thanks in advance.

 

 

Luke

[KDirk]

Near as can be determined, there were no production cars sold with cloth seats in 88. Some very early build units in the testing and promotional  pool had cloth, but it appears any of these that were eventually sold (either retail or to GM employees) were factory converted to leather seat upholstery. Consequently, very few pictures of the cloth seats exist. I recall seeing only one such photo (probably posted here a few years ago), and the upholstery pattern was identical to that of the leather seats. It has been speculated that most of the cars that had the very early cloth seats were not sold as they were test mules and were probably  crushed when GM had finished using them for that purpose. This is supported by the fact that low 1988 VINS under about 40 or 50,  IIRC, have never showed up as registered anywhere.

 

That said, are you referring to the early production seats that had color matched suede leather bolsters, or actual full cloth? If the former, pictures of that seat upholstery are more readily found as those cars still exist  "in the wild". I have one such 88 with a burgundy interior that has suede bolsters on the seats. The pattern is identical to the full leather seats used in later production, just the outer panels on the seat surfaces are suede with the balance being normal cowhide leather.

[doity]

Thanks, I already have the suede bolsters on mine.  I did do a quick look for them on Google but didn't find them.  I thought it would be a nice touch to add velour seat covers as my seats are a bit worn and I did a two-tone dye job on them that looks good but is getting worn somewhat.

[Barney Eaton]

As noted by Kevin, there is good information showing a number of early vins were made with cloth.  If you do some historical research on the Reatta, early plans were to have cloth standard and leather optional. Wire wheel covers you have been the standard wheel, and many of the standard features that were on the production cars would have been options.  At some point they decided to release the car "loaded" so in 1988 the only option at release was the 16 way seat option.

Any vehicles built with cloth interior were either test cars that never went to the public or the seats were upgraded to leather before they were sold.

The way we know which cars had cloth is from the document supplied by Larry Gustin...it listed all Reattas built. from that it also told us the paint color in color code (40 = white) and it listed the seat code, example 991 =blue standard seats, 981 = 16 way blue and the early cloth had the code 191 for blue cloth.

The last early Reatta built with cloth seats was 900098 and it had code 191 which would be blue.  900095 & 96 were built with code 181 which would be blue 16 way cloth.

I only see 25 early cars being built with cloth, the last being 098, all the rest had leather.

Edited April 14, 2017 by Barney Eaton (see edit history)