I have a set of seatbelts that are dirty and they look like they have been stained with coffee. I have washed them with soap and water and left them out in the sun to dry, but they look the same. They are from 1965 and I don't want to use anything on them that will cause them to disintegrate. Any suggestions for cleaning them and getting rid of the stains?

Jim...I cleaned all the seatbelts in my 68 with auto upholstery cleaner. They are black and they weren't real dirty. They did come out nice. I figured they are cloth, so upholstery cleaner shouldn't damage them...Bill

Jim: I did a previous post on this subject and was told that you can clean the seat belts is the dish washer (using no detergent.) I washed mine in the sink with clothing detergent and a lot of dirt came out of them. They were still stained or sunbleached so I touched them up with liquid black shoe polish (the belts are black.) This worked well and they look good. Do a search and you will get a lot of info. Thanks.

I soaked mine overnite in a bucket of water and laundry soap then rinsed and then dyed them with Rit dye. Now they look like new.
Ron

Ever hear of the dye coming off on clothes?

Tim

Another idea to try i soaked mine with undiluted Bleach-White for about 5 minutes and rinsed them with plenty of water They went from an un-reconizable color to the original dark blue. Very pleased with the results.

Originally posted by BLU69:
Ever hear of the dye coming off on clothes?

Tim Well, I'll tell ya, this summer I did a lot of sweating in the Tennessee heat on those vinyl seats. I usually wear white tee shirts and didnt see a sign of the dye coming off the belts on my clothes.
Ron

Soak them in Oxyclean.

what about the shoe polish. How is it with white T-shirts?

I just did the shoe polish job so I have no experience. I only had to do the rear seatbelts (I swithch the crummy front ones for the better rear ones.) Do a search. I saw no one that had done this,and there were quite a few that had,that had had problems with the shoe polish coming off.

Jim, I just did my seat belts this summer.I soaked all of them in a bucket of oxyclean,then rinsed them off,then soaked overnight in a bucket of woolite, sprayed a little Tuff Stuff foam aerosol cleaner on them, and used the Rit dye, available at grocery stores. You may want to cover up the white date code tags with a good masking tape ,3M BRAND at local paint shop, so dye wont dye date tags. Dye never rubbed off, looks great. I tryed it both ways using the Rit dye and the liquid Kiwi shoe polish and I liked the dye much better, and by soaking in woollite ,the belts came out really soft.I hung my belts up on a nail and held other end of belt still , while I brushed the dye on the belts on at a time using a cheap paint brush. Good Luck Mark

I just cleaned the belts in my 65 and the problem Im having is adjusting them, you have to really pull on them to get them to tighten. Any suggestions?

I filled up the sink with warm water and dumped some Castrol super clean in and scrubbed them up.They came out great.

Don't seatbelts deteriorate with age? Isn't it kind of risky to bet your life on 38-year-old webbing? Given no ABS (hell, no disks for that matter) and no airbags, I want to know that my seatbelts are going to keep my face out of my windshield. Are old belts really not a problem, or is this just an authenticity tradeoff that people are willing to make (like no ABS and no airbags, lol!)?

Reid

Don't seatbelts deteriorate with age? Isn't it kind of risky to bet your life on 38-year-old webbing? That is one of the reasons I posted the question. I remember reading somewhere that dyeing or cleaning the belts with harsh chemicals could damage them.

Originally posted by JimN:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Don't seatbelts deteriorate with age? Isn't it kind of risky to bet your life on 38-year-old webbing? That is one of the reasons I posted the question. I remember reading somewhere that dyeing or cleaning the belts with harsh chemicals could damage them. </font>[/QUOTE]I'd absolutely avoid any solvents or oil-based products, that's for sure.

People do dye their old belts and continue to use them, but how many of those belts have been put to the test? Even without the dye, the whole idea makes me nervous (but to be honest probably wouldn't have 20 years ago). We're not talking about a piece of trim, we're talking about something that's there to save your butt if need be. My two cents is to put in new ones, or at least more recent ones. Good luck whatever you do (may they never be needed).

Reid