Premature Failure of Fabric: Anyone Else Have This Problem?

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Grash, you are not alone.

Here is a quote from another forum:

"We can have a 2013 cross country sports coach. All of the covering on the driver and passenger seat sofas and dinette are peeling and flaking. Have contacted forest river to no avail. Is anyone else having this issue."
 
I'm having a similar problem with de laminating fabric in my 2010 Coach House Platinum 11
I've read on forums that numerous builders in the industry used inferior fabric around 2008-2010
Coach House acknowledged this and graciously offered to change out the old for new at a generous discount
My vehicle is currently at the factory having the work done.
While there, I'm having new floors and window treatments done as well
I was impressed that they were cooperative.
 
the fake leather vinyl stuff in mine is delaminating.  I called the company that makes the furniture for thor last summer to see if replacements were available or if they would make the same cover in a different fabric.  Of course they can't.... contractually
Had an interesting conversation though with the lady, and how the RV manufacturer is the one that spec's the fabric.  They just make it.
She also said that the regular fabric stuff is the same material that you would find in home furnishings, and would last a long time.... where this cheap fake leather stuff is just cheap and will not last.

I think I kinda knew this in my gut when we bought but DW wanted the "leather" thinking it would handle spills form the kids better.
 
blw2 said:
I think I kinda knew this in my gut when we bought but DW wanted the "leather" thinking it would handle spills form the kids better.
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Don't lose sight of the fact that even if you had spec'd the fabric rather than the "leather" it would have been cheap fabric, also.  Good upholstery fabric isn't inexpensive.  The only difference is that you wouldn't have had the delaminating issue; it simply would have worn through.
 
Nothing at all wrong with "fake leather". The top quality Ultraleather and Naugahyde brands are superior to "real leather" in many ways. Whether fake or real, fabric or leather, cheap is cheap and isn't going to survive well.

For what it's worth, the Flexsteel seating and sofas in the coach I sold recently were all real leather, actual split grain cowhide. At age 13, the leather was getting hairline cracks and in a few places that flex a lot the finished surface had flaked away. My wife knows all about caring for leather and was religious about it, but it doesn't last forever either. Especially when exposed to direct sun and drastic variations in heat & humidity.
 
I'm a little late to the party, but we have a 2008 Jayco with no fabric issues. We keep the shades down when not using the camper, to minimize sun damage to the interior.
 
GRASH said:
I have a 2010 Jayco Melbourne where in 2015 the bucket seat covers and couch cover began rapidly deteriorating and just flaking away to expose the foam rubber underneath.  It cost me $2140 to reupholster the fabric.  Indeed, this is a very premature failure of these fabrics and one would hope for a much higher quality and more durable material from Jayco.

I?m wondering if other RV owners have also experienced premature failure of the upholstery fabric in their RV?s?

All the upholstery professionals I talked to commented on the low quality of the upholstery material used by Jayco.  I discussed the problem with Mr. Robbie Dotson at Ocean Grove RV (a Jayco dealer in St. Augustine, FL).  Robbie told me that he had seen many instances of the problem of flaking off of seat/couch covers, as I have experienced, in Jayco RVs, sometimes occurring in fairly new RVs.  He stated that he understood that Jayco, Inc. was changing manufacturers of the chairs, couches, etc. in their RVs to address the problem. 

However, Jayco customer service has denied that there is a problem with their fabric, as follows:
?We are very sorry this has occurred but if the material had a ?severe quality issue? as you have indicated, we would be hearing from other customers and we just simply are not.  I?m not sure where Robbie is getting his information but what he is saying is not indicated by phone calls or customer complaints to our customer service team.?

This problem with the extremely low quality fabric is just the latest issue in an extremely long list of low quality issues I have encountered with my Jayco Melbourne.
Click to expand...

The premature failure of "Ultra Leather" is long standing.  I have three instances where it peels off like dead sunburned skin leaving only the fabric to which it was bonded.  Comments flaming manufacturers should be a wake up call to the manufacturer to more closely evaluate, in this case, their fabric selection instead of taking the word of the furniture or fabric supplier.  The old GM "Fisher Rub Test" is one of the best evaluation / test methods for fabric wearability and environmental condition response.  I have a 50 year old Alaskan Camper with normal use and the fabric is still providing a good seating surface.  This as compared to a 5 year old Ultra Leather drivers seat I viewed in a Class B and another 7 year old passenger seat.  When my desk chair started peeling two years ago it started as a small blemish.  Some manufacturers becoming aware of the Ultra Leather or vinyl coated fabric have discontinued the use of Ultra Leather.
 
Sorry, didn't see this thread back in February. Seems to me there are some short memories on here. There was a bunch of talk about this about 3 or 4 years ago on this forum and others. Our Thor we had at the time was doing the very same thing. It seems that some inferior products had been used, and there were lots of people with this same problem. Our coach was a 2007, and this began happening around late 2012/early 2013. We've since gotten another coach and do not have problems. Our very good friends have a 2012 Tiffin that is now doing the same thing. Tiffin sent them new material, but they have to pay to have the seats recovered. It appears that this happens somewhere around the 5 or 6 year mark.
 
The ultraleather in our 8 year old Winnebago Journey is like new and we live in it for about 6 months a year.
 
As I have posted on other threads, not all fabrics that look like Ultraleather are made by Ultraleather and that even that company makes several grades of fabrics.  RV manufacturers specify how much they want to pay for upholstery and the seating companies buy fabrics that match their price points.  Ultraleather is just one of a number of urethane finished fabrics made by several manufacturers. 

Last year we purchased a pair of deluxe FlexSteel captains chairs upholstered in the best Ultraleather available on the market.  The pair of them were >$4k.  Not to boast, but it's unlikely that the OEM seating in your RV was at that price point unless you had a very high end unit.
 
I have a 2011 Jayco "Superlite" fifth wheel.  The fake leather covering on the sofa has been flaking badly for about a year or two; it flakes off in hunks.  No harsh atmosphere, no sprays, no nothing but normal use as a sofa.  And not much of that, my wife and I prefer the two swivel chairs instead.

My wife made fabric covers to cover up the deteriorated fake leather and now the sofa does not look so trashy.

Incidentally, Jayco has not heard from me about the flaking fake leather because being several years out of warranty, I know they won't do anything.  So there may be more failures of this type than they know about.
 
I have to chuckle a bit about upholstery "premature failure". Upholstery is a wear & tear item, subject to deterioration through usage, spills, sunlight, heat/cold, humidity, and just plain aging.  It all looks good on Day 1, but quality (read: cost) will eventually become apparent. Sooner if subject to harsh usage or weather conditions. Unlike furniture in your home, RV upholstery is subject to a wide, sometimes extreme, range of environmental conditions and cracking, flaking, etc. will be one of the likely results.

RV makers can and do use upholstery and flooring quality as a major cost containment factor. They can use less expensive upholstery and flooring materials with full confidence that it will look good on the sales lot and last through the warranty period.

It appears that Jayco low-balled the upholstery choices in some of their models, and this particular one deteriorates in a really obvious manner.  However, at age 7 or so, it's far out of warranty so don't expect anything more than a shrug from Jayco [or any other RV manufacturer].  If you bought a chair at Walmart and it lasted only several years, would you expect to take it back for a free replacement?
 
While this is an old posting, I want to thank GRASH for raising the issue. I had the same problem with my Thor Citation and I was worried that after spending $2600 in reupholstering the dinette cushions and completing replacing the lounge chair, that it would happen again. So, I'm relieved to hear that it was likely not one of the 20 or so things that I could think of as causative agents - it was just cheap fabric. I can rest easier now.

For the several people that made negative comments about the initial posting, I wish that these forums could be limited to helping others. His posting and others that responded with helpful responses were valuable to me. Thank you GRASH.
 
We have a 2015 FR Berkshire. The same flaking occurred recently on the driver's seat and one of the dinette booth seats. We contacted Forest River and they advised that the covers for the front seats and the 2 booth seats are made by 2 different companies. They sent us 2 new seat covers for the front for free, but we have to take care of installing them ourselves. Note that we received a seat cover for the passenger seat even though not showing any wear or flaking. We are going to save that one until needed. Covers arrived today and they seem to be a better quality. We don't have a trip planned until the end of June, so we have time to care of the install on the driver's seat.

As for the booth, FR would only give us the contact info and see we were on our own to work it out with that manufacturer. Instead, we chose to take it to a local reupholster and have him do it. Cost was fair, fabric is much higher quality, and he did it in a few days. Much better than sending out and we like doing business with the local, little companies.
 
I have a 2009 Jayco Seneca. I bought it in 2012. At that time I noticed there was some peeling of the couch ?leather? on the head rest area of the couch. It wasn?t a huge deal at the time as I was excited to own a big Super C and I just assumed it was sun damage since it was in an area next to the window. Since then, the entire couch, and just about everything else except for the recliner (must be a different material) has peeled badly like big hunks of dead skin. It?s ugly and I?m at a loss on where to turn to fix the issue. I?m in southern Illinois. It isn?t exactly the top RV service Mecca in the world around here. It just grinds me to no end that this could happen on any product that retailed in the 175,000 dollar range. So for now I?m stuck until I figure out a solution. It?s so far out of warranty I know it would be futile to ask Jayco for help.
 
My experience has been that local upholstery shops, particularly those who do automotive or marine work, ought to be able to reupholster your furniture.  There are a number of companies that make urethane-faced fabrics of the sort that are used in RVs (the best known of these is Ultraleather).  Again, my experience has been that you get what you pay for with respect to fabrics.  As for the skill of the shop you choose, that's something only you will be able to decide by looking at examples of their work.
 
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