[PRCo] Re: Car 100's Seat Fabric

[Fred Schneider]

I do not profess to be an expert at the subject of fabric  
longevity.   I'm trying to think back to things I've read over the  
years on automobiles ... supposedly those people who estimate the  
value of automobiles for a living and cannot afford to be hoodwinked  
can simply glance at a vehicle and tell if items a, b, c, d, e, f  do  
not all show the same number of years and miles.   The odometer  
reading and the wear under the driver's tush should be comparable.    
I always thought that leather lasted longer than fabric but the trade  
off was a much greater first cost.   Leather, therefore, was  
something you put into streetcars, buses, and high priced automobiles  
because it lasted longer or showed that you could afford the best.

Today the transit answer is plastic because it is more difficult to  
cut with a pocket knife.   Or Naugahide because it is cheap and  
approximates leather.   When the Baltimore Streetcar Museum redid  
their Peter Witt 15 years ago Naugahide was used.   Sufficient animal  
hides, as I recall, would have exceeded $10,000 plus labor in  
1990.    That lead to the house joke that he killed a lot of Naugas  
to restore the car.

On Mar 12, 2006, at 12:03 PM, Edward H. Lybarger wrote:

> I have no idea how long the seat material actually lasted in  
> service.  And
> note my wording in the initial post..."which has been represented  
> to us as
> coming from 'the demonstrator' car."  We were not told that this  
> was the
> material on the car when it was new.  Apparently PRCo used several  
> patterns,
> and it is possible that when the car was painted "buff and tan" on  
> May 5,
> 1939...an entirely new look...the seats were reupholstered as part  
> of the
> overhaul.
>