bushburner
Member
Someone on here got a quote before, not sure if it's available. It was around $160. Call up tesla and order some, then you can sell your matte to someone else.
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Matte finish seat backs now standard?
- Thread starter Paul Carter
- Start date
Yinn
Active Member
Matte vs Gloss:
We have the Matte in our S, and the Gloss in our X, so I feel like I can give a good summary and comparison.
- Our matte is scratched up severely and shows the grooves and looks horrendous.
- Our matte feels less fragile and more durable, resulting in us treating them with less care - most likely resulting in the above.
- The matte backs feel less slippery with no noticeable effect on....anything.
- Our gloss has fingerprints and footprints all over it and looks horrendous.
- Our gloss feels more fragile and less durable, resulting in us treating them with the utmost care to prevent scratching - most likely resulting in the lack of scratches.
- The gloss backs feel more slippery with no noticeable effect on.....anything.
My wife prefers the matte backs and dislikes the gloss backs. This may be due to our S having the glossy dark ash wood trim and it would just be a lot of shiny surfaces.
I'm the reverse, I think the gloss backs add a nice touch to the car and it feels more luxurious. This may also be because our X has the matte obeche wood that soften and warms the car a little bit, so the extra gloss doesn't seem as hard/cold.
In summary - they don't matter. It's a thing you can dive into while waiting for your car, but it won't really change your experience. I suppose to some this may matter, but to me it's very much a <shrug>
#firstworldproblems
We have the Matte in our S, and the Gloss in our X, so I feel like I can give a good summary and comparison.
- Our matte is scratched up severely and shows the grooves and looks horrendous.
- Our matte feels less fragile and more durable, resulting in us treating them with less care - most likely resulting in the above.
- The matte backs feel less slippery with no noticeable effect on....anything.
- Our gloss has fingerprints and footprints all over it and looks horrendous.
- Our gloss feels more fragile and less durable, resulting in us treating them with the utmost care to prevent scratching - most likely resulting in the lack of scratches.
- The gloss backs feel more slippery with no noticeable effect on.....anything.
My wife prefers the matte backs and dislikes the gloss backs. This may be due to our S having the glossy dark ash wood trim and it would just be a lot of shiny surfaces.
I'm the reverse, I think the gloss backs add a nice touch to the car and it feels more luxurious. This may also be because our X has the matte obeche wood that soften and warms the car a little bit, so the extra gloss doesn't seem as hard/cold.
In summary - they don't matter. It's a thing you can dive into while waiting for your car, but it won't really change your experience. I suppose to some this may matter, but to me it's very much a <shrug>
#firstworldproblems
mal_tsla
Member
One thing that matte seat backs MIGHT impact is the usability of suction cup mounts on the seats. Those of us with small children often use suction cup mounts to stick an iPad onto the back of the first row seating on long trips. This allows kids to watch movies on long drives without breaking their necks, and works wonderfully with the glossy backs. Of course, in most other cars you can just use a headrest mount, but Tesla's seat design precludes that.
With the matte backs, does that solution still work? Because there aren't many solutions that would work in the X, so it would be sad to lose the one that is known to work well. In our case, the kids will likely not care about this by the time we're ready for another car (they'll be older). But just getting an X today, if suction cups are not workable due to the matte seatbacks, I guess I'd be resorting to an adhesive and magnets.
With the matte backs, does that solution still work? Because there aren't many solutions that would work in the X, so it would be sad to lose the one that is known to work well. In our case, the kids will likely not care about this by the time we're ready for another car (they'll be older). But just getting an X today, if suction cups are not workable due to the matte seatbacks, I guess I'd be resorting to an adhesive and magnets.
There are some sticky suction mounts that are able to stick to matte surfaces. While I haven' tried them on matte seatbacks, I had one installed for years on the matte dashboard and it only came off once in the years that I had it installed. When it came off, I just applied a drop of water to reactivate the sticky pad of the suction cup and it's been on the dash ever since. I'll try moving it to the Model S temporarily to see if it stays put there.
mal_tsla
Member
Thanks! Keep in mind, though, that suctioning on the setback is a vertical hold (the iPad is hanging perpendicular to the seat back), so that needs maybe a little more firm of a hold than a dashboard mount (likely more upright?)
Yinn
Active Member
I can confirm they work on both. There's literally no functional difference.
Zaphod
Galaxy President (former)
Won't have my X back until Monday and will take some pics
It's at the detailer getting its plastic surgery
It's at the detailer getting its plastic surgery
FlyF4
Son of a MX
Oh gee, I must have somehow missed this thread during a search before I started my own thread asking this same question. Looks like the latest X is coming with Matt black. That is what the wife and I prefer anyway.
FlyF4
Son of a MX
FlyF4
Son of a MX
That's probably because I can hear your kids saying... "put your feet down or daddy will kill us!"... kidding. Glad to hear they actually hold up well because that was one of my concerns about glossy seats.
Zaphod
Galaxy President (former)
Doh, thanks, somehow I missed those. Are the matte seatbacks more contoured than the glossy ones or is the finish just accentuating the shape more now that they are matte?
I was going to put matte film on my seat backs but decided at the last-minute to go with matte on the exterior and gloss the seat-backs. Now that the matte is becoming standard, I'm glad to have a "Limited Edition" model X with glossy (and protected) seat backs. I would have been sad if I'd spent $600 to put matte film on seatbacks when later buyers were getting them for free!
Yoonoo
Member
Looks like it's not just seat backs but also the monopost seat base. The base used to be glossy before, now it's matte. Here's a picture of the seat base from earlier builds: