I posted this before about the quality of the leather in the Lariats. Its poor. Well my leather is flaking off on the left side of the D/S seat. I went to my Ford dealer and they agreed its not as good as the 97to03 seats. They are gonna order me a new upper seat cover but said it looks like it will happen again. Has anyone else got this problem? Oh I treat the leather about once a month with a conditioner so its not drying out.

 

Had my drivers seat bottom and steering wheel both replaced, so called leather was peeling off, steering wheel now looks like the threads that they sewed it with is coming out. Under leather coating is pure white material, don't know what it is, also mine is a 03 and have noticed on the earlier ones that they have breathing pours in the seats and mine has none.

 

In the good old days, automotive leather was dyed to obtain the final color. Today, unless you're buying a hyperexpensive vehicle, the final color is essentially paint on top of undyed leather. If the cleaner/conditioner has some type of chemical incompatability with the paint, or if the paint is incorrectly formulated, applied or contains some type of impurity, it will flake off, just like a house paint.

Just to play it safe, I would switch brands of leather cleaner/conditioner. BTW, I'm assuming that you're not using Armor All, or some type of product designed for vinyl. These products will ruin leather in a relatively short period of time.

Funny, in the old days, leather was preferred over cloth for durability. Today, between the decline in leather quality, and the improvement in the properties of textile materials, I'm starting to wonder if the reverse is now true.

 

I use Meguire's Gold Class Leather Cleaner and Conditioner on my '05 Lariat. Armor All will dry out the leather.