TheUnstitchd
A leather jacket is a vital motorcycle clothing a biker should have. Its necessity may not be overlooked if you make a short trip. But it becomes an indispensable part of your motorcycle gears when you plan to set out for a long journey. It helps you to save from blowing strong wind, dust, and other irritating objects in the air while driving a motorcycle at high speed.
Cleaning a leather motorcycle jacket is fun! You don’t need to know rocket science. Instead, understanding the use of some cleaning products will help you speed up the process of cleaning your leather jacket. Most leather jackets have two parts, meaning that you can separate the interior portion of the jacket for washing purposes. If you own a leather jacket that does not have the feature, you can still comfortably clean your leather jacket.
Before I go further, I would like to clarify why you should clean your leather jacket and how you can do it. As a biker, you might not clean your leather jacket frequently. When you use the jacket for days while riding on a bike, there develops a bad odor, the smell of sweat and salt inside the jacket.
When you sweat, the interior part wipes. Dust and similar things make the exterior part of the jacket dirty. In this situation, you need to clean your leather jacket.
Long story short. Cleaning the interior and exterior of the leather jacket and then let it dry properly is the straightforward process of cleaning. And, finally, apply conditioner for rejuvenating your leather jacket.
For your convenience, I will divide this whole process into three parts. In the first part, I will show you some steps to clean the interior portion of the jacket, followed by the exterior part in the second phase. And, lastly, I will share with you how to rejuvenate your leather gear.
So, let’s begin, shall we?
Segment One: Cleaning the interior part
You can complete the segment in a few steps. At first, you have to look at your jacket whether the interior portion is removable for washing. If your jacket has a removable interior, it becomes more convenient to clean it. Just remove the part from your leather jacket and send it to your washing machine. It takes less time to wash the interior of the jacket.
Is the interior of your jacket not removable?
Don’t worry.
Use Febreze to remove bad odor
As the interior is not removable, hang your jacket on the rack and apply Febreze to eliminate the bad smell from your jacket. When you are done with spraying the odor eliminator (Febreze), leave the jacket for minutes to dry it. After drying the jacket, you will find no bad smell.
At the time of riding on a motorcycle, you sweat, and the feature of your leather jacket (sweat-wicking) swab the sweat. There are microbial that produce while sweating and thus creates lousy odor inside your leather jacket.
Apply de-Salter
While you use your jacket for days and sweat can leave salt on the jacket. As a result, there may be a funky bad smell inside your jacket. In this situation, you have to apply de-Salter to remove the odor from the jacket. To do so, you have to turn your jacket inside out and use it properly.
Let it dry for a few minutes. When it becomes dry, you will experience there is no bad odor inside the jacket.
Segment Tow: Cleaning the exterior part
The exterior part of your leather jacket or gears comes direct contact with the dust and other harmful things in the air. The original color of the jacket also ruins due to direct sun rays on the jacket.
Use leather cleaner for your jacket
There are numerous leather cleaner products out there in the offline and online market. Among them, you have to choose wisely what will be the best option for your leather jacket. If you use animal-based cleaning products, you will end up seeing your jacket in another color, meaning these products can fade the jacket’s original color.
So, finding the right product for your leather jacket is a priority for you. Now, you can start your cleaning process by applying the cleaning product on your jacket. Don’t apply too much because it may damage your leather jacket.
Clean it correctly with a rag
Use a rag to clean your leather jacket. Here, you can add some cleaning material to the cloth and gently rub over your leather jacket. For proper cleaning, you need not apply too much cleaning product to your rag. Apply as much as you need to remove the dirt from the jacket.
If you use too much to your jacket, instead of cleaning, it will be bleaker. So, rub the rag over your leather jacket gently so that it becomes more transparent.
Allow times to dry the jacket
In this condition, your jacket is almost bright. But for the last step, to apply conditioner to your leather jacket for making it more buoyant, you have to allow sometime to dry it properly. Without making it dry completely, you cannot apply the conditioner because it might not work well.
Segment Three: Applying conditioner
This step makes your leather jacket shinier. To apply the conditioner, make sure you have a dehydrated leather. Spray the conditioner on the leather jacket slowly so that you should not leave any area of the jacket. Also, take a soft cloth and add conditioner in it as well. Now, gently rub over the jacket for the best shiny result.
Final Verdict
Not only for your leather jacket, but you can also apply the same techniques and steps to clean other leather gears of motorcycle, including gloves, boots, and the like. If you can follow all the steps as mentioned above one by one, you can end up having a clean and shiny leather jacket for the next trip.