[Eurocar_lover]

2012 535i xdrive
There is about 18" at about mid height of the seat where this has worn & ripped b/c of the way the owner got in/out of the car (rubbing against it - sliding in/out). I looked up the piece and it's like $380 and I was quoted another $250 for install (at stealership). The rest of the gasket looks perfect though.
The part # is:
BMW (51-76-7-226-395)

I was wondering if I could maybe buy the whole thing from a wrecked car and use that. I was thinking that even if a salvage yard has a gasket that is damaged, if the section I need is still good, I might be able to splice it. If anyone has any suggestions on where to find this gasket for less than

IDK if you all know how to splice rubber or similar, but this works great for O-rings & other gaskets. If you have an o-ring that is too big, you can cut a section our and glue it back together (normal super-glue works great - some swear by Krazy-glue brand gel - others like Locktite super glue - though at $20/tube....) you cut both sides that are to be joined together at the same time, at a 30-45 degree angle. Cutting both at same time ensures they will mate perfectly when glued together. This works very well for large door/window gaskets as well. So I'm considering this.

On a side note, this will work with silicone O-rings but you need something different to glue them IIRC b/c it's obviously a different material - but the other glue is just as strong. Testing of these O-rings shows most are 90-97+% as strong (as original un-spliced) when stretched & pulled apart - but most are only used in compression, so this doesn't really matter. You can save a lot of time & money with this trick, especially when you need very rare size o-rings.
You can also splice multiple rings to make a larger one or make many smaller from a larger ring (or gaskets for all of what I said)....