Magic Eraser On Leather

I

imported_cushdrive

New member
Ok guys, I replied to a thread on here a while back regarding Magic Erasers and leather. I was of the oppinion at that time that the Magic Eraser was much too abrasive to use on leather. I stand corrected and below is the link to the thread discussing the process with before and afters.....



Ultimate Napa Leather Correction - WOW! - BMW M3 Forum.com (E30 M3 | E36 M3 | E46 M3 | E92 M3)



I've heard of people using sandpaper to restore their leather before dieing it. This may be a milder form of that process. One that does not require the die afterwards.



Enjoy.
 
cushdrive said:
Ok guys, I replied to a thread on here a while back regarding Magic Erasers and leather. I was of the oppinion at that time that the Magic Eraser was much too abrasive to use on leather. I stand corrected and below is the link to the thread discussing the process with before and afters.....



Ultimate Napa Leather Correction - WOW! - BMW M3 Forum.com (E30 M3 | E36 M3 | E46 M3 | E92 M3)



I've heard of people using sandpaper to restore their leather before dieing it. This may be a milder form of that process. One that does not require the die afterwards.



Enjoy.
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I have always used Magic Eraser's on my leather. There are many nay sayers here, however I have never experienced a problem with using it on my leather, or a customers. Honestly, I would be more afraid to use Woolite or APC on leather than a magic eraser. I like to deep clean with the Magic Eraser, and maintain with products such as Lexol.
 
evenflow said:
I have always used Magic Eraser's on my leather. There are many nay sayers here, however I have never experienced a problem with using it on my leather, or a customers. Honestly, I would be more afraid to use Woolite or APC on leather than a magic eraser. I like to deep clean with the Magic Eraser, and maintain with products such as Lexol.
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would you take a handful of fiberglass shards and scrub them into your leather?
 
gbackus said:
would you take a handful of fiberglass shards and scrub them into your leather?
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I've used the Eraser on my own Ford leather over 6 times, and have not noticed any adverse affects. Other than the seats being clean.
 
evenflow said:
I've used the Eraser on my own Ford leather over 6 times, and have not noticed any adverse affects. Other than the seats being clean.
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Way to sidestep the question there.
 
gbackus said:
Way to sidestep the question there.
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No side stepping going on here sir. Obviously I would not rub my leather with fiberglass shards, thats kind of a silly question to ask. Don't know how you would relate that to a Magic Eraser. All I know is I am having success with what I am using, and so are other people. If something goes wrong, then ill slap myself on the wrist for not listening to the good people on Autopia. But up until now, if I have not done any damage after six uses, I highly doubt I will do any damage at all. It isn't like an eraser is my go to leather cleaning product, its for times when my leather seems very dirty, and embedded with contaminants.



If I am having success, and so are other people there is really no reason to question the process. These people are using it on their BMW leather.
 
gbackus said:
Way to sidestep the question there.
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Just because the members of the M3 Forum aren't also members of the autopia forum does not make them any less knowledgable. These people have never steared me wrong and if they had, I would not have posted the link. So to answer your question, if people were getting good results from scrubbing their leather with fiberglass fibers, then I would be going to buy some fiberglass this weekend to use on my e36 and e46. That's in no way saying that you have to do the same.
 
cushdrive said:
I was of the oppinion at that time that the Magic Eraser was much too abrasive to use on leather. I stand corrected
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I'm not saying anyone is right or wrong here, just voicing my experience. B4 using a magic eraser on my car interior i tested it to remove shoes scuffs on white bedroom door and it worked well. But after everything dried i noticed the eraser removed the top layer of the paint finish, so what was a semi-satin finished door now has spots of flat finish (hope that makes sense).



So in my experience the magic eraser is abrasive and I'm not using it on my car interior.
 
cushdrive said:
I was of the oppinion at that time that the Magic Eraser was much too abrasive to use on leather. I stand corrected and below is the link to the thread discussing the process with before and afters.....
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Your initial thought was the correct one. In your link the poster was using MrCME to knock the gloss off. Sounds abrasive to me.
 
haper said:
I'm not saying anyone is right or wrong here, just voicing my experience. B4 using a magic eraser on my car interior i tested it to remove shoes scuffs on white bedroom door and it worked well. But after everything dried i noticed the eraser removed the top layer of the paint finish, so what was a semi-satin finished door now has spots of flat finish (hope that makes sense).



So in my experience the magic eraser is abrasive and I'm not using it on my car interior.
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You are absolutely correct. Do not use the magic eraser on paint! I'd be willing to bet it would clean your shoes nicely though ;)



Guys despite earlier suggestive comments, the magic eraser is not made of fiberglass!
 
GatorJ said:
Your initial thought was the correct one. In your link the poster was using MrCME to knock the gloss off. Sounds abrasive to me.
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It may be a valid argument that the abrasiveness is knocking the gloss off, but the way I look at it is this.....how many of you leather owners have been greated by glossy leather when you opened the door to a brand new car? New leather (at least bmw leather) is NOT glossy when it is new and in its cleanest form. My argument is that the magic eraser is bringing the leather closer to that new state.
 
The glossy appearance of leather after wear is caused by the build up of dirt together with abrassion and can also be the build up of wrong product use which adds to the problem.



Magic Erasers are made from melamine resin that has been ground up and reformed and acts as a very fine sandpaper. They work by removing the top layer of the finish on the leather which will remove the shine but as you can see on the picture it is also removing colour (that is not dirt) which means that once you have cleaned you have removed some if not all of the finish.

This is fine during a restoration process as you will be refinishing over the top but not ok as a cleaning process.

Leaving the leather unfinished will leave the leather itself open to dirt and body oils which will start to deteriorate the leather itself (this is then unfixable - finish can be fixed and repaired but the leather itself can't).

The damage that is done is not always visible to the naked eye but can be seen very clearly with a microscope.

The tests we have done with these sponges have always removed finish and/or pigment.

The magic eraser is not taking the leather back to its new state but is degrading it.



The first time you use a magic eraser may not do too much damage but you have started a process that if continued will only get worse and worse.



As consultants we recommend that these are not used to clean leather (even if they say they can be) as the manufacturers do not have to deal with the problems they cause
 
I've used the magic eraser on leather before, but that is because I did not have a steamer and it was awful do-or-die leather on a beater truck--very trashed. I did *ok* but did put significant wear in the leather. In some spots I quickly went through the protective vinyl leather. Keep in mind I'm a guy with a gentle hand.



There have to be at least 1000 things better than MCME IMHO.
 
evenflow said:
No side stepping going on here sir. Obviously I would not rub my leather with fiberglass shards, thats kind of a silly question to ask. Don't know how you would relate that to a Magic Eraser. All I know is I am having success with what I am using, and so are other people. If something goes wrong, then ill slap myself on the wrist for not listening to the good people on Autopia. But up until now, if I have not done any damage after six uses, I highly doubt I will do any damage at all. It isn't like an eraser is my go to leather cleaning product, its for times when my leather seems very dirty, and embedded with contaminants.



If I am having success, and so are other people there is really no reason to question the process. These people are using it on their BMW leather.
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Magic Erasers are essentially bonded fiberglass shards.
 
gbackus said:
Magic Erasers are essentially bonded fiberglass shards.
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You sir, have no idea what you're talking about. If fibrous glass were an ingredient in the magic eraser then the MSDS would have to list it. In fact, it does not. Melamine is the active ingredient as stated earlier.
 
Asking someone if they'd rub fiberglass shards on their paint isn't a valid question. I wouldn't rub ground glass on my car, either, but I've been known to use silica based abrasives in a car polish. Asking such a question is nothing but flame bait.



And after reading up a bit on melamine, I see no relationship between it and fiberglass.



Instead of asking flame bait questions, how about participating in the thread in a positive manner?
 
SuperBee364 said:
And after reading up a bit on melamine, I see no relationship between it and fiberglass.
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It's a fibrous abrasive material, which I think was his point. You could also say it's similar to asbestos. None of which I would rub on my leather seats, by the way.;)
 
I can't believe that guy did that to his whole beemer interior and then got a bunch of others doing it too! This time I'm with Judy. It's taking the protective finish off.
 
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