Upholstery and Fabrics - recovering restaurant chairs

I am in the process of cover about 50 chairs. They are plan round padded seats. I took one apart and the foam and plywood circle are in excellent shape. They are currently covered with vinyl and I will be covering them with an upholstery fabric. Instead of taking the vinyl off is it possible to reupholstery right over the vinyl using the upholstery fabric? If I were to put new foam over the vinyl, tack it some glue so it wouldn't move would this work? How would I do this if it were possible?
Thanks for your help.

i don't see why you couldn't just upholster right over the existing vinyl, as long as it's not ripped or torn or otherwise not smooth. and i also don't see why you'd need to add more foam, if the existing is still spongy enough. but i'm not a professional upholsterer either. if you don't get any other advice, i'd try it on one & then test it: sit on it - a lot! see if the new fabric slides around or moves or anything. if it passes the test, do them all!

I also think you could go right over the vinyl and it would work fine, but I wouldn't do it. I would take a blade, cut off the vinyl, cover the foam with a layer of bonded dacron, tack down the dacron, then cover with the fresh material. If it was the other way around, vinyl over cloth, I would more likely go over the cloth. The reason, vinyl needs to breath. I bet if you look at the bottom of the chairs you will see breathing holed. The vinyl moves at a different rate than the cloth, cloth is so porous nothing special is needed for it to breath.

M M is correct....done enough of them I could spit....short cuts are a good thing...but not in this case...good luck

Look at bottom line. If it costs more to remove and replace upholstery and recovering without removal is not a problem, then recover. Bottom line dictates what small businesses do.

Bottom line does not dictate what this small shop does......There are enough jobs out there that are cake to make up for the ones you may not profit as much on.....Think those of us who work with a spirit of excellence knows this....just a thought....:).......If they are the owner of the rest. then this may work...