The Dreaded Peeling Leather Dash - G12 740I

[LuckyW]

[Cregeis]

Has anyone found a local trim shop to fix the peeling dash or found another solution other than replacing the whole dash?

[Opie55]

Originally Posted by Cregeis

Has anyone found a local trim shop to fix the peeling dash or found another solution other than replacing the whole dash?

This is an issue across several forums, and I have yet to see a thread about any other successful repair besides replacement. Sometimes people will say something like "no trim shop will touch it" but they don't say why. They don't say whether the trim shop said the material cannot be stretched back and reattached, or whether it was simply an access issue. If you want to close the loop on that, I would take the car to a couple good trim shops and ask them whether they could stretch and reattach the leather if the dash were sitting on a table and not in the car. That's step one. Remember, this is not just a glue failure issue that new glue can fix. The glue was ripped off when the leather shrunk from heat. Some I've seen are not too bad, and others are really bad. But I have no idea whether it can be stretched at all - presumably using steam. So that's a question you need to ask. If they tell you it can be stretched and could be repaired on a table, then ask them if they think they could do it if just the windshield was removed. I'm skeptical of that because the leather is tucked down under the plastic vent strip at the very front, and it would just be awkward to work that way. I doubt any trim shop would agree to pull the dash themselves, and I would not want them to. So if they give you a high degree of confidence it can be fixed if it were out of the car, find someone to pull it if you cannot do it yourself. But given how many threads I've seen on this issue, I remain surprised nobody has ever said whether a trim shop said if it was possible to fix if it was out of the car.

[NYAWE60]

Im waking this thread up because it deserves it. There are too many of us that have this issue for us to not have a definitive solution by now. The F15 is now 10 years old and this has happened as early as 2-3 years into the generation (back in 2016-2017). Having BMW repair it for $5000-7000 is unacceptable. This is their most premium SUV prior to the arrival of the X7.

You'd think they'd have a class action lawsuit about it by now. But I can't seem to find one like that. Moreover given how handy the BMW community is, I figured we'd have some info about how to remedy the issue independently or with local upholsterer shops especially those in metro areas.

Has there been any new info regarding this problem?