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Regina

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Recommendations on what to use for cleaning and protecting Bennington seats? Is there a recommendation by Bennington for approved cleaners and if approved cleaners/protectant are not used the warrant is void?
 
What year ? If it's Simtex you can do a search in the upper right corner .
 
Regina said:
the year is 2023. I am not sure what Simtex is? Is that a new material being used instead of vinyl?
Click to expand...
Simtex is a higher end marine vinyl, and very different from older traditional marine vinyl. It’s been put on Bennington’s since the 2016-17 model year with higher end models, and filtered down through the lineup in the 2017-2019 model years. Great material! It is certainly what you have on your 2023. Read over the cleaning instructions Jack shared with you above. Using non-approved techniques and cleaners can void the warranty coverage on the furniture/Simtex, so certainly best to stick with them. With my 2017, the normal Dawn dish soap cleaning recommendation has kept ours looking great now for 8 years, and we have not yet needed to try some of the other techniques for more advanced stains. That said, we also have somewhat strict rules on certain things not allowed on the boat that could stain, so that has gone a long way for us as well.

Finally, here is the link to Bennington’s Simtex cleaning video:

Cleaning Simtex
 
Vikingstaff said:
Simtex is a higher end marine vinyl, and very different from older traditional marine vinyl. It’s been put on Bennington’s since the 2016-17 model year with higher end models, and filtered down through the lineup in the 2017-2019 model years. Great material! It is certainly what you have on your 2023. Read over the cleaning instructions Jack shared with you above. Using non-approved techniques and cleaners can void the warranty coverage on the furniture/Simtex, so certainly best to stick with them. With my 2017, the normal Dawn dish soap cleaning recommendation has kept ours looking great now for 8 years, and we have not yet needed to try some of the other techniques for more advanced stains. That said, we also have somewhat strict rules on certain things not allowed on the boat that could stain, so that has gone a long way for us as well.

Finally, here is the link to Bennington’s Simtex cleaning video:

Cleaning Simtex
Click to expand...
All of this information has been so helpful. I greatly appreciate everyone's response. So far I have only used Dawn dish soap and water. I also have strict rules. Do we no longer need to worry about applying a UV protectant? On my 2015 Bennington I used 3M all in one cleaner, conditioner, and uv protectant. My seats looked like new when I sold it in 2020.
 
Tagging on to this post with a related question. I have looked high and low, and cannot identify the exact brand of Vinyl on the seating or Flooring (non-carpet) on our 2018 20SS. I was under the impression that this was a transition period and this post confirms.

We are second owners and we did reach out to the original dealer for the information but the information they provided was not detailed enough to guide us on the EXACT products we should use. So far the vinyl looks great but we'd like to be sure to use a protectant if we are supposed to do so and the flooring is in now need of a deeper clean than just water/rag.

Any ideas on how we can identify our flooring and vinyl specs? Thanks so much.
 
Welcome to the Forum Bennie! Can you share some pictures of your seating and flooring. In person, it would be easy for most of us to identify if you have the Simtex vinyl seating, or if the ‘`18 SS still had the traditional vinyl. It did get transitional with the entry model during this time frame. A picture might be enough, but in person its easy to differentiate if one has seen/been on both.

Flooring options were pretty much versions of smooth vinyl or woven seagrass vinyl options. So search the forum for people talking about cleaning their vinyl flooring and it will apply to you too. Others might speak up soon too with what they have found works great for them with their flooring.
 
Contacting Bennington with the Boat / Hull ID number might get you the specs also....but Jeff is 100%, a picture is worth a thousand words.
 
I have attached a picture of the vinyl and floor, but just used the Bennington Build site for the floor plan. Turns out I don't have a good picture of the whole boat from above. But mostly, all of my "whole boat" pictures have innocent people not looking their best - so didn't want to post on a forum. LOL.

As far as an in-person assessment...we are in Western Pennsylvania in case any forum folks are located in these parts!

Thank you so very much. I have lurked for years but this is my first post!
 

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Nice boat!

It is more of the outgoing furniture “design” style around 2017-18. However, I cannot tell about the fabric from the picture. Is the seat vinyl fabric really “soft” to the touch and feel for vinyl? Or is it a bit rigid and firm? Because of the furniture design style, I lean that it the outgoing traditional vinyl fabric, but honestly, cannot be certain. Sorry. :-(
 
The seat material looks like the soft touch vinyl to me, not simtex.
 
The seats feel buttery - like a good well-conditioned leather would feel. It is very smooth with no kind of texture at all so I am also leaning towards non-Simtek. We have been using 303 a few times a year as passed along to us from the original owners (reportedly from the dealer) and so far so good. So cross fingers that it isn't really Simtek after all.

Per other good advice, we will reach out to Bennington for final word.

This forum has been so interesting and educational, I really appreciate the wealth of information and willingness of the members to help each other. On that note, thanks to all of you for taking the time to help me!
 
My new boat has Simtek and 303 is recommended by Bennington in the owners manual. Interestingly the product the dealer uses isn’t recommended. So will use 303.
 
The nice thing is the recommended clearness expanded this past year for Simtex. It had been more limited. That gives more flexibility to owners. This is nice in regards to both cleaning & protecting the seats with an eye towards not voiding warranty coverage.
 
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