On the outside of my driver seat and the passenger seats the leather is starting to crack and get bad... is anyone elses max doing this to them? How much do you think it would be to fix this...

 

nope i always use leather conditioner... looks good as new still.

 

I always condition the leather of my seats on a regular basis and recently i noticed a small crack on the outside driver seat and passenger

 

You cant really fix it unless you get it re-upolstered or the entire seat changed. Put some conditioner on it and it will be a bit better.

 

well they cant take that part of it off and put a new leather on it... i think its fake leather the part thats ripping...

 

The outside of my front seat is tearing also. It was that way when I bought it. I don't have the money now to have the section re-done, so I just glued the tear down with some fabric glue so it won't continue to rip. It works pretty well - but just a temporary fix.

 

My driver side is riped to . I send a letter to Nissan Canada about 4 months ago to tell them that is sometihing wrong if the seat start cracking after 36000 Km (2001 so no more waranty on that), so far no news from them .
That part of a seat that is cracking is not a leather so conditioners do not work on it so much. I asked one shop and they told me that the only way to fix it is to take the seat out, remove the leather, rip of the cracked piece, saw in new piece and put everything back together and they wanted $350 CND so for now I am driving with cracked seat .

 

Just be glad you don't have 97-02 Ford F150 leather.

 

You should condition it on a regular basis.. Like a quick pass after you wash the car if anything... Depending on your weather (dry or humid) with tons of sun, cracking can come quick and I would strongly suggest you condition the leather regularly... Especially the seats that are sat on the most. I actually condition mine once a week. I have a neighbor with an '00 GLE and his center console is cracking as well as his seats, he does not condition regularly....

 

i always clean and condition my leather seats and i have not one crack in my seats... with great leather... comes great responsiblity!!

if it is cracked you are screwed, possibly you can find one undamaged in a junk yard. i am pretty sure that the leather on the sides is not fake leather... the only fake leather i know of is on the doors. and yes i clean and condition that the same as the real leather!

 

I'm using Lexol, good stuff

 

Lexol, the fake lether is on the sides, back of the seats... only the surfaces that you sit or lean up your back against are real, all other surfaces are leathish vinyl.

 

i use meguiars leather wipes. gives a nice shine to it and conditions at the same time. for some reason tho my driver side seat seems A LOT softer than my passenger seat. i could even go as far as to say my passenger seat is hard compared to my seat. especially on the butt part where i sit down. nevertheless they are both fairly soft but just in direct comparison to each other. and i drive by myself 99% of the time and hardly ever have passengers in the car.

 

Honestly, i mean i've seen quality leathers in alot of cars where the owner does nothing and they stay fine. I used to religiously condition my leather, with meguiars and lexo,l whatever... Every 3 weeks. Crappy leather that comes with our cars will wrinkle and dry out or crack eventually. We aren't exactly driving mercedes...

If you seriously hate it, i say make them replace it under warranty... I wouldn't really buy fancy leather covers. As long as the leather isn't ripped or really bad, i wouldn't care so much...

Also, using the heated seats certainly doesn't help the matter.

 

I usually use Lexol, but got some of those Meguiars wipes. It leaves a slippery surface that I don't really like, but then less binding of the leather. As for softer leather on driver side... mine is like that too. I guess by sitting on it you stretch it and it doesn't shrink back as quick. Although after using the wipes, the driver side seat leather straightened out a bit. less sag? looks tighters?

 

I used the Meguiar's wipes once. They also left the leather too slick and shiny and I didn't like that as I want my leather to be conditioned and clean looking but not shiny. Regular conditioner by Meguiar's is decent though - I usually use Lexol or a similar but less expensive product from my vendor.

 

If it's minor cracking, I'd recommend Leatherique.

 

i have been in many mercedes and bmw's all priced above $80,000 and the leather in them rips and tears easier... it is to soft and delicate. honestly the max has decent leather in it.

my best friend is a dealer and he had his 300m detailed every week by his staff and that s**t was thin as hell and split and cracked still. the leather in my 2000 looks brand new still, and i always use my heated seats, even in the summer ( i am up walking all day so it feels good on my lower back). it also depends on how much you weigh... i only weigh 170 lbs, however, if are like 250 lbs... that is a lot more stress on the leather, and the leather is not designed for some one that big.

just because a car cost a lot of money does not guarantee that it is high quality. my friends top of the line BMW 330 sucks a**, it has had three new computers, two radios, all new brake system ( rear-ended someone at a stop light because the brakes stopped working), and several AC controllers.

another aquantence of mine had a $125,000 mercedes that was in a shop more than he drove it. he paid someone to wreck it for him!!! then he got a brand new BMW 7 series and returned it two days later.... hated it (and yes he RETURNED it, it is nice to be rich and have everyone kiss your a**). he went with a cheaper X-5. he told me that the cheaper cars he bought were more reliable and felt better.

all in all i love my max and really cannot complain about it...

 

So true. I think the leather is fine.