How many square feet of upholstery in an interior?

[Desert Rat]

Kind of a down in the weeds question, but I'm picking out colors & materials for my interior and if there's an easy way to keep the weight down, well, you know.

I've got several samples from Lemke and when weighed on my postal scale I discovered that there is quite a bit of weight difference in the different materials and textures. Most of the leathers, either real or faux weigh about .7 oz for a 4.3" x 9" sample, but a couple of the ones that have a bigger grain pattern are thicker and are almost twice as heavy.

If it's 15 square feet (just a guess) for seats and sidewalls thats a difference of a couple of pounds just based on which leather texture I pick, so I'm just trying to quantify if it's enough material that it's worth considering.

 

[71459]

Good idea keeping it simple and keeping the weight down. You will be rewarded with a better handling airplane. I sewed my own seat covers - no sidewalls, just denim seat covers and some feather light auto carpet pieces. I don't recall how much material, but not very much. The whole thing must be less than one pound.

 

[PaulvS]

It all adds up but builders seem less concerned about weight now than in the earlier days of RV building. Van himself always emphasised to keep everything as light as possible.

I'm also working on seat coverings, the wool fabric weighs 450 grams per square meter. 15 square feet sounds low. Each seat is about 1.5 ft wide and 4 ft long so that makes 12 square feet per seat, not counting the edges. Add in the side panels and the total is more like 30 square feet. I guess it's about finding the right balance between appearance and comfort, versus performance, for what you want in your plane.

 

[Mike S]

If the fabric has a texture, grain, or pattern you wish to keep uniform, you will most likely need more than if you were using a simple solid color.

 

[wirejock]

Interior

You could save weight with no side panels or carpets.
None in mine. I'm sure it's a bad thing but I can always add them. I was kind of suprised. The seats have some weight. Mine are faux leather. No smell but they are very soft.

 

[Desert Rat]

If the fabric has a texture, grain, or pattern you wish to keep uniform, you will most likely need more than if you were using a simple solid color.

Understand, but I'm just looking for a rough approximation of how many feet in a finished airplane because it turns out that even in the same material family, the type of surface finish impacts the weight of the raw material.

Based on the samples I weighed, if it's 30 square feet as Paul suggests, thats a 4 pound difference just based on which leather I pick.

Not that this was in my mind when I asked the question, but that's more than enough to compensate for the fancy seat heaters I splurged on. Kinda gets back to the whole comfort vs. performance tradeoffs that were also mentioned.

 

[Desert Rat]

You could save weight with no side panels or carpets.
None in mine. I'm sure it's a bad thing but I can always add them. I was kind of suprised. The seats have some weight. Mine are faux leather. No smell but they are very soft.

Yeah, but in my case, the chief passenger in charge is going to expect a full interior

 

[Ralph Inkster]

Cloth seat covers - every time I'd enter the cockpit & slide down into the seated position, my shirt tails would be bunched up to my shoulder blades. The 2 RV6s I bought with these covers got changed up to faux or real leather in short order.
Real Leather covers - a bit heavier, slippery, & had a cold feel to them.
Faux Leather covers - not quite as slippery & had a warmer feel. My vote is for Faux.

 

[Robbie0208]

Material Weights

When dealing with the Faux Leathers, you can expect a pretty uniform weight with the material over the entire interior.

With Real Leather - This is mechanically thinned, and will very slightly regardless of what the surface finish is. A Cows hide is not uniformly dense, and some of the leather, while having the same thickness, will have a different weight due to density.

The manufacturer gives a weight of anywhere between 620-980 grams over a cubic meter.. Thickness can vary as well between 1,0mm and 1,4mm.

You are not going to see a big difference between a finished interior with a Nappa Finish, and with the structured finish.

Weighing the samples is not going to give you a very good estimate to make an informed decision with.