89 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme door armrests sticky and gooey

[GnatGoSplat]

It's a bit of a bummer, my 89 Cutlass door armrests are very gooey and sticky due to sweating plasticizer.  It's been going on the past few years.  I've read this is how vinyl decomposes, and it won't stop until the vinyl becomes hard, brittle, and cracks.  I've been cleaning it off with isopropyl alcohol in the meantime, but it's just temporary.  Going to try cleaning it again, then putting 303 Aerospace Protectant on it.

Anyone else have this problem and found a solution that works?

 

 

[94 olds vert]

This is something that I remember hearing about years ago about when modern day cars would age. The plastics would decay and the first stage is when they get sticky. Then over time that stops and the plastics dry out and get hard and start to crack. I don't think it's possible to reverse this process once it get started. I know it's a big issue on foreign cars that are around 20 years old. They always seem to get the sticky buttons. 

It is just going to keep happening. The best thing would be to clean, protect and keep it out of the sun to reduce the decay rate. Unfortunately these cars don't have a lot of aftermarket support, so getting new interior pieces isn't really an option. Buying a used one is likely going to have the same issue. 

Pretty impressive the car went 30 years without having that problem. Lasted much longer than most. 

[GnatGoSplat]

Yep, I've also read it's not reversible, which is pretty annoying to have to clean it with alcohol all the time.  It's been out of the sun for the last 5-years, but the damage is already done.  Also gets pretty hot in the garage and I'm sure that doesn't help.

Only permanent-ish solution I could really think of is to have it wrapped in color-matched leather.  Might look nice if professionally done.  Only thing is if leather needs to be glued down, it wouldn't stick for long if the vinyl underneath keeps sweating.  Maybe it would need to have the vinyl stripped off, then built up and sculpted with some other material to the right shape so that part can be leather-wrapped.  Sounds like very high cost.  Other parts of the car would need attention before I go to that extent to fix it though.

 

[rich_e777]

I have the same thing happening on my Lincoln but not other cars. Its slowly turning the steering wheel and parts of the door cards a pinkish, lavender color from the light grey it should be too. I keep a reflector screen in the windshield so most of the interior stays in the shade. So I`m not 100% convinced its just the sun causing it.

A similar thing is happening with a firebird where a black tar like substance is building up inside several electrical connectors in the engine bay like the big firewall C100.

Edited July 16 by rich_e777

[GnatGoSplat]

Discoloration never even occurred to me.  I don't think it's discoloring in the Cutlass yet.

Yeah, I strongly suspect heat also plays a big part.  It's been garaged over 24-years, thought it did spend ~10 hours a day during the Spring/Summer/Fall out in full sun for 19 of those years.  It was 100% outdoors for 8+ years before that.  I don't know if that's enough cumulative UV to cause this kind of vinyl decomposition.  My garage does get really hot in the summer though.  About 10-degrees over ambient, 15-20 if I've driven any of the cars, as the hot engine makes the garage even hotter.  I've seen rubber belts in VCRs and cassette decks literally turn to black goo when stored in a hot garage, and that kind of equipment almost never sees sunlight.

Seriously thinking maybe I need to install a mini split in my garage.

 

Edited July 18 by GnatGoSplat

[Black92GS]

In all honesty….I don’t believe there is anything you could have done to prevent it.  I believe the issue has more to do with the chemical composition of the material and its natural breakdown more than anything else. Likely some combination of the dyes and materials used, cleaning products and skin oils over the years that caused it. If you look at cars that have spent their entire lives in climate controlled storage, you can find some where the headliners have failed in the same manner and in similar time frames as those were exposed to the elements. The foam backing failed mainly due to time, rather than environmental conditions. 
 

I experienced something like this a number of years back at work. I was routing and securing cables using a pack of coloured cable ties. The pack was older, but unopened and was stored indoors. They all worked as intended, except for the green ones. Every single one would break apart with the slightest amount of tension applied. The translucent ones and the other colours were all fine. A few years later, we started seeing broken RJ45 jacks….but only the green ones again. Didn’t matter if the jacks were hidden all their lives or exposed to the sun and completely yellowed out….only the green jacks were prone to breaking with very little effort. It had nothing to do with them being green, but something about that particular colour led to them breaking down differently than the others. 
 

 

[RareGMFan]

I think a lot of cars have this issue. The Lexus ES generation after mine is notorious for the dashboards (and often the door cards) turning into a sticky, crumbling mess. My generation had issues with the passenger dash air bag shrinking and warping, greatly widening the otherwise tight gap between the bag and the rest of the dash. Here's an example, though this isn't even as bad as they eventually get.

 

 

I didn't learn about this until I finally starting to find a few in the junkyards where I noticed almost all of the dashes were like above or worse, and then noticed the top gap in mine ever so slightly getting wider. I started using a sunshade as soon as I noticed it, and knock on wood, it hasn't gotten any worse since. Still sucks because the rest of the interior is damn near mint.

[jiggity76]

My International sat outside for a good part of it's life.  But, the original owner had the windows tinted and even though I don't like it, it saved it's red interior.  My armrests aren't gooey yet or breaking down from what I can tell.  Maybe the tint helped with this?  If I drive it to work, I also put the windshield screen up primarily to protect my repaired non warped dash pad.  I'd like to someday have the tint removed and then just have the clear UV protected tint added.  I want a factory look but with the added UV protection.

 

Edited 8 hours ago by jiggity76

[GnatGoSplat]

It's very possible, tint does block most UV.

That tint looks awesome!  I can't get over that you don't like it.   I personally hate clear windows in everything.  I mean, I really hate it, maybe more than you hate fake DRL headlights.   I've seen some people get 35-50% tint and I'm even like, "what's the point?"  Getting my Fleetwood tinted is the first thing I'd like to do to it.  35% is legal limit here, but I'm planning to take the risk on 20% like I did on the 94 convertible.  I'd meant to take my 89 back to get the front windows done, but never got around to it.  Probably should have, if it's indeed UV causing it, but it could very well be a combination of temperature and age as well.  The dash vinyl, for some reason, has held up fine.  I drove screws into it to un-warp it about 30-years ago, and it's stayed un-warped this whole time.

They do make clear tint just to block UV.  I was thinking to have that done on the Fleetwood's windshield.  It does have a slightly bluish color to it, though.

I don't think tint hurts the factory look.  Lots of car ads portray them with tinted windows because it looks so much better.

[jiggity76]

1 hour ago, GnatGoSplat said:

It's very possible, tint does block most UV.

That tint looks awesome!  I can't get over that you don't like it.   I personally hate clear windows in everything.  I mean, I really hate it, maybe more than you hate fake DRL headlights.   I've seen some people get 35-50% tint and I'm even like, "what's the point?"  Getting my Fleetwood tinted is the first thing I'd like to do to it.  35% is legal limit here, but I'm planning to take the risk on 20% like I did on the 94 convertible.  I'd meant to take my 89 back to get the front windows done, but never got around to it.  Probably should have, if it's indeed UV causing it, but it could very well be a combination of temperature and age as well.  The dash vinyl, for some reason, has held up fine.  I drove screws into it to un-warp it about 30-years ago, and it's stayed un-warped this whole time.

They do make clear tint just to block UV.  I was thinking to have that done on the Fleetwood's windshield.  It does have a slightly bluish color to it, though.

I don't think tint hurts the factory look.  Lots of car ads portray them with tinted windows because it looks so much better.

I really want this car to be as factory correct as I can.  That's primarily why I want to go back to a more original look with the clear.  Plus, my bud who's a Police Officer keeps hounding me about it, LOL.  Definitely not legal for the door glass.

[Black92GS]

3 hours ago, jiggity76 said:

My International sat outside for a good part of it's life.  But, the original owner had the windows tinted and even though I don't like it, it saved it's red interior.  My armrests aren't gooey yet or breaking down from what I can tell.  Maybe the tint helped with this?  If I drive it to work, I also put the windshield screen up primarily to protect my repaired non warped dash pad.  I'd like to someday have the tint removed and then just have the clear UV protected tint added.  I want a factory look but with the added UV protection.

 

The tint definitely would have helped prevent the interior from fading by blocking a lot of the UV rays. 
 

But the melting issue is definitely a new one for me when it comes to a 1st gen W. Can’t say I’ve ever seen that happen before….but perhaps the time has come for some of these issues to show up. With the way that car has been treated, I’d expect to have heard other reports of this happening over the years on cars down south years ago if it was common. This is what’s making me think this is more of a chemical reaction and/or a natural breakdown that’s occurring that can’t be stopped with tint or climate controlled storage. 
 

Slightly different situation, but my old 88 Regal used different headliner material on the sunvisors than on the headliner itself.  The material used on the sunvisors was the same one used on the earlier 80s GMs that was very prone to sagging. By 13 years old, the sunvisors were sagged and the foam material was completely broken down and rotted out. The actual headliner was perfectly fine though, and the foam backing was still holding up well when I scrapped it around 2008.  

[jiggity76]

10 minutes ago, Black92GS said:

The tint definitely would have helped prevent the interior from fading by blocking a lot of the UV rays. 
 

But the melting issue is definitely a new one for me when it comes to a 1st gen W. Can’t say I’ve ever seen that happen before….but perhaps the time has come for some of these issues to show up. With the way that car has been treated, I’d expect to have heard other reports of this happening over the years on cars down south years ago if it was common. This is what’s making me think this is more of a chemical reaction and/or a natural breakdown that’s occurring that can’t be stopped with tint or climate controlled storage. 
 

Slightly different situation, but my old 88 Regal used different headliner material on the sunvisors than on the headliner itself.  The material used on the sunvisors was the same one used on the earlier 80s GMs that was very prone to sagging. By 13 years old, the sunvisors were sagged and the foam material was completely broken down and rotted out. The actual headliner was perfectly fine though, and the foam backing was still holding up well when I scrapped it around 2008.  

That is interesting how the sun visors disintegrated but yet the headliner was ok.  

My armrests are still soft and pliable, I just had to really clean them due to the years of elbows and forearms constantly touching them.  They were pretty dark and black.  I used a gentle mixture of Dawn soap and warm water and just gently rubbed them with a lint free cloth until the red started to appear.  

My headliner and sun visors are perfect in this car thankfully.  The STE...not so much.  The California desert pretty much baked it's interior.  I'm SO THANKFUL that the International has such a nice interior.  It's part of the reason why it's a 1 of 1 car.  I'm actually restoring the front seats in it right now.  The side bolster on the driver's seat is worn out.  I'll post pics soon.

I have all the hard pieces figured out and collected on the STE.  It will be pricey though but I'll do a little at a time.  The rear seat headrests and upper top portion of the seat will need to be reupholstered.  The front seats are in great condition and just need to be deep cleaned.  Same goes for the carpet.  Got a new dash pad and found some really nice door panels with perfect door panels.  I posted in my thread about all these parts being found.  The biggest win was finding a perfect set of door speaker grills and the lenses for the door lamps.  Took me years to find those!

The original door armrests and the ones I pulled from a junkyard STE...again, not sticky or gooey at all.  Pliable and very nice with no cracking or discoloration.  I really lucked out there.

Edited 3 hours ago by jiggity76

[Black92GS]

33 minutes ago, jiggity76 said:

That is interesting how the sun visors disintegrated but yet the headliner was ok.

Different material compositions. I used that example since they were in the same car and in similar spots in the car, the storage conditions could be eliminated as a variable. 
 

I’ve seen examples of low mileage vehicles that were stored exclusively in climate controlled environments.  Some years and models of GM vehicles will experience headliner sag due to the backing breaking down no matter what. Yes, the climate controlled storage may have slowed it down a bit for some….but probably not as much as we’d like to think.

Another observation I’ve made are the front shoulder belt guides.  88-90 are of a different style and material than the 91+.  The 91+ style always turned a sort of chalky looking white with age, regardless of storage conditions. The 88-90 style may have faded a bit with tons of UV exposure, but almost always remained nice and black.