Citroen DS seat cover replacement part 7

Removing the seats from the car is an easy way of cleaning underneath them, and the trim underneath my seats was rather dirty. A good clean showed the original vinyl trim in good condition, which was great to see. Shame about the blue carpet, but that will be a project for the future.

I found that it was easier to remove the drivers seat before I tried to re-install the passengers seat, not only to get a good clean, but also in terms of access to the four bolts that hold the seats down.

In part 6, the passengers seat […]

Citroen DS seat cover replacement part 6

The passengers seat is now complete! In part 5, I was able to remove the old targa covers and get the seat down to foam. After a test fit of the covers, I felt they were too baggy, so I bought some additional foam from Clark Rubber. I went with the 25mm high density foam and bought four pieces. 2 61x52cm for the bases and 2 61x77cm for the backs. While the addition of this foam made it hard to get the covers on, it was worth it. I am much happier than the baggy appearance I had before.

I […]

Citroen DS seat cover replacement part 5

Now the rear seat is complete, it is time for the front seats. I started with the passengers seat, so I can still drive the car if necessary, as I expect once i’ve done the passengers seat I will be faster on the drivers seat. The seat rails are bolted onto the car with 4x11mm bolts, and the rails are held to the seat also with 4x11mm bolts.

The front seat foam was in good condition and had been replaced by foam from a company in Sydney, at least after 8 digit numbers came in. Interestingly, even though this […]

Citroen DS seat cover replacement part 4

In part 3, I was halfway through installing the covers on the upper part of the rear seat. Today I was able to complete the job – the rear seat is finished, in the car and looking great.

To finish the job, I had to insert the final hog rings on the upper part of the seat. The foam and springs were quite delicate from age, so I had to be quite careful. In an ideal world I would have replaced them, but that isn’t possible at the moment.

I also had to fit the rear arm rest. My rear […]

Fitting new Citroen DS door cards

Citroen DS door cards are quite simple as the door handle etc is above the actual door card. So all it comprises of is the arm rest and a small hole for the window winder mechanism. The door card is held onto the door through a series of metal clips that attach into holes drilled into the door. The holes are fitted with plastic plugs that are gripped by the clips.

The door cards come without the clips, but with the attaching holes pre-cut into the backing of the door card. The clips have to be eased onto the backing […]

Citroen DS seat cover replacement part 3

In part 2, I was able to get part way through removal of the old Targa seat covers for the upper part of the rear seat. Today I was able to complete the removal of the old Targa covers and start fitting the new ones.

I was helped by a website created by an owner of a DS20 Comfort who has documented the same process using the same covers from Citro Toon. The website is in French, but pictures are universal and Google translate helps with the rest.

Despite the website, this part of the seat has been the most […]

Citroen DS seat cover replacement part 2

Today I made good progress replacing the seat covers in the DS. In part 1, I had removed the old cover from the bottom of the back seat. Today, I was able to fit the new seat cover. I’m really happy with the result – it looks great!

I found that using lots of small bulldog clips to get the cover in the right spot was a big help – I could position it and check it before I used the hog rings to actually secure the cover. I had purchased a set of hog ring pliers for the install […]

Removing Citroen DS door cards

Removing door cards on a Citroen DS is quite simple. The door cards are held on by the window winder and a series of metal clips. The metal clips attach to the back of the door card, and align with holes in the door that have plastic ‘cups’ that the metal clips slot into. The window winder is removed by pushing back on it and exposing the pin that can be pushed through from either side.

To ensure that the door card does not get wet, there are plastic protectors for the larger holes that are needed if access to […]

Citroen DS seat cover replacement part 1

While I was In Europe in September, I purchased some new interior pieces for the DS. This included a set of seat covers, door cards, headrests and armrests. While there wasn’t anything wrong with the seat covers, the door cards were in poor shape, and I wanted to go to a cloth interior from a targa (vinyl) one, which is not correct for this car and not breathable in the Australian heat.

I started with the bottom of the back seat, as I figured this would be the easiest (it is just a big rectangle and one piece), and […]

A visit to Citro Classique / Citro Toon

While I was in Europe, I stopped off at Citro Classique (also known as Citro Toon) in Borculo, about an hour outside Amsterdam. My idea was to make good use of the 60kg of luggage space I had available to me for my return flight to Australia and the use of a rental car to pick up a few things and save the shipping.

Citro Classique provide a great range of different reproduction interior pieces including carpets, door trims, seat covers, headrests, headliners and the like. They are a supplier to the large European websites like Der Franzose, but they […]