The wheel in my 1987 Camaro was getting pretty bad. The top had twisted, worn through and was gooey to the touch. Someone at some point had put some black goo on it to "fix" it.

I don't feel like spending the $600 CAD it would take to get the OER or Hawks recovered wheel to me in Canada. I never contacted Chuck Pelton but from what I have read his prices are similar to Hawks.

I called every upholstery shop in town and no one will touch a steering wheel, even when I said I would be prepared to spend $400 or so it someone would just do it, they still had no interest.

So after a year of thinking about it, I've decided to recover my wheel myself. I'm sure I can master upholstery in 20 minutes...JK.

Today I took the old wheel leather apart. I used a thread puller to take all the stitching out. The other day I got some leather from the upholsterer.

This is what I started with:





This is how everything looks now:









So I am fully dissembled. The next step will be to find a rubbery backing similar to what the factory put under the leather. It feels almost like tool box lining...maybe that is what I will use?? I should also get some leather cement or something to glue the seams down.

 

Ive thought of doing the same, but i'm not at that point yet, but same thing happened when i wanted my shift ****/e-brk handle redone. Ended up doing them myself.

 

Following with interest.
Let us know when you're going to tackle a dash pad as well!
My steering wheel is 50/50 but since moving to frozen, zero winter humidity Alberta, my dash pad became toast almost overnight. (Not to mention the smashed windshield from the rock strewn highways around here). Turned my car into a COTM contender to a POS over the course of one season.
Thanks for listening.

 

Never thought of just doing it myself. Make sure you use UV resistant thread, I've had non-UV thread fade pretty badly in a car interior after just a couple years.

 

I didn't think of the thread for UV resistance. I have begun stitching. The holes show some of the lighter backing. Once done I will use a bit of dye to fix up the holes.

I got my Mom to help sew together the 3 pieces of leather once we cut them out. I used the old leather as templates.

Hand stitching with a "baseball" pattern like the factory. Very time consuming!

 

Nice job, I would love to try to do that

 

Just FYI....There's a place in Dallas that will recover the wheel for $300. It's called Craft Customs.
I've thought about recovering my leather wheel, and i have removed it and replaced it with a practically new vinyl wheel (because the leather wheel had bad horn buttons and looked like crap.)
I don't find the vinyl wheel objectionable, and may leave it on and save myself the $300.

 

What foam/backing did you decide on? Excellent work btw.

 

We have a member Chuck Pelton that recovers steering wheels.Nice Job by the way

 

I used non-slip drawer liner, lol. If and I might, do it again, I will find something better.

 

I finished the leather stitching. A miss-measurement caused the seams to be crooked on the sides. The 1/4 sections should have been 1/4" longer and the top section 1/2" shorter. Not the end of the world for me. I may at some point do it again. I would like to find some bad wheels to try again so I don't have to take this one apart. I used non-slip drawer liner for the under pad, this caused the wheel to be a bit wrinkly. Next time I would fine a smooth rubber.

The good thing is I made patterns out of cardboard for the leather. A little tweaking of them and the leather would come out the right size.

I will use a bit of black dye to fill in the stitching holes to hide them.

 

Pretty good for a first try. How thick was the original lining? Maybe there is a silicone liner or something that wont break down over time like the OE foam did.

 

Thanks. I'm happy with it for now. I measured the original lining. It was around 3/64", maybe 1/8" originally. A silicone sheet might have made a good liner, nice and smooth.

An observation about why maybe these wheels end up so bad. Simply put, wear and tear. 30 years of sweat and hand oils break down the leather, then it twists and starts to tear at the top because that's where most people hold onto the wheel. I have a 1989 Mustang and it has a plastic steering wheel and still looks new. Not many cars that are 30 years old even had leather wrapped wheels. Probably why we see it so much on the Camaros.

 

My 1987 Z28's wheel looked exactly like yours did in the first few pics. It was twisted and eaten away at the top, after only three years! I don't think they were made very well to begin with. I give you a lot of credit for giving this project a go!