The "pimp-ification" of my car continues.

I had a spare steering wheel since I bought a replacement to get the cruise control option. Not willing to leave well enough alone, I decided to bring out my trusty sewing machine and cover the older wheel with blue and black Alcantara to match the diamond quilting I had done in my previous project. In reality, 99% of the stitching I wound up doing by hand. I only used the machine to reinforce the joints between the two colors. Before any of you ask: no, I have never done anything like this before.

I also figured out a way to move the steering wheel cruise and stereo/phone controls from the other wheel back to this wheel. It turns out it can be done (regardless of what the dealer tells you), but it is definitely not for the timid as it involves chopping the rubber on the wheel hub with an Exacto knife.

Below are a few pics I took tonight after I installed the wheel in the car. Also note my new V12V/DBS shifter which I installed at the same time.

I will post more pics/details of my project in a little while.

 

Looks Great! Kudos on being up to a challenge!

 

You are a brave man! But I must admit it does look nice!

 

Great job KF. You are highly skilled, and quite daring!

 

That looks like a daunting task, to sew an Alcantara cover on the steering wheel and keep it tight and factory appearing. What are the steps in doing so? I'm very curious as I think nothing feels better in the hand but the Alcantara does nub and pill over time (my Porsche had one) so it would have to be replaced periodically.

 

You, sir, have some cojones! Looks great.

 

So, um, next time you swing over to Orlando, bring your sewing machine. I'll pick up some red Alcantara and, you know, give you a beer or something for your trouble.

Seriously, that's so well done and appealing. I've long complained that the steering wheels in our cars are the weakest part of an otherwise stunning level of awesome. While the new cover can't change the shape, it sure changed the character. Nicely done. I can't wait to see it in person.

 

Always inspiring KF

 

Impressive!
Btw, where did you source the DBS shifter?

 

It looks da'business! Great job! I've been tossing around doing a similar steering wheel treatment for mine. Would you be willing to explain how you did the stitching?

 

Thanx. I found the shift **** from an eBay seller in the UK. It was brand new/never used. I paid £275 plus shipping.

 

Damn - that's a good price!

Do you have steps as to how to install? thanks

 

Thanks for the compliments, guys. Here are some of the details of the project:

I removed the airbag cover from the car. This is a pretty simple task, but all the usual caveats apply since you are toying with a highly explosive device, you do this at your own risk.

There are 2 Torx screws that hold the airbag to the wheel. Turn the wheel 90º and remove one screw from the top rear. Turn the wheel 180º and remove the other screw. The airbag will be loose now. To remove it, you will need to pry it off with a little bit of force up and towards you. It clips onto the 3 horn buttons below it. This is a 2-stage airbag, so there are 2 connectors going to it. To remove them, you must slide the yellow plastic latch and then pinch the 2 side pins as you pull.

The picture below shows the wheel installed with the airbag removed.
1: Horn buttons
2: Phone/Stereo switchpack
3: Cruise control switchpack
4: Airbag connectors with sliding yellow latches
5: Steering wheel retaining Torx bolt
6: Horn and switchpack plug
7: Horn and switchpack connector on steering wheel clock spring.


Here's what the airbag looks like removed from the car:


and here's the back side:


The following 2 pics show the airbag being covered in alcantara. Originally, this is as far as I was going to go; but my projects seem to take on a mind of their own.



Here's the airbag covered in alcantara back on the car:


These pictures show me unstitching and removing the leather cover from my OEM wheel:




Here's the wheel without any leather, front and back:



These pictures show the physical differences of the wheels with and without switchpack controls. The arrows point to the areas where notches need to be in order for the controls to fit and attach.





Here's what the wiring and horn buttons look like if you do not have steering wheel controls:


And here is the wiring, horn buttons and switchpacks if you do have steering wheel controls. Note, there are multiple combinations of these; i.e. you can get a wheel with stereo controls, but no cruise; cruise but no stereo controls; or both. Also, there have been 2 different versions of the left switchpack. The older version controls the phone only, the newer one is for both phone and stereo control. You can tell them apart because the older controls have an icon of a human head on them where as the newer ones don't.


In order to migrate the switchpacks to the original wheel, I would have to cut notches in the rubber hub to match those on the wheel with the controls. Here is where I made two very interesting discoveries. First, all wheels are manufactured the same. If you have left, right or both controls, the notches are cut accordingly. and the wheel has a score line where the cuts need to go. Second, the wheel has 4 metal nuts embedded into the rubber that the switchpacks screw into. I thought I was going to have to improvise something here, but after cutting the first notch with and Exacto knife along the score line, I realized that the nut was already embedded into the rubber!

This picture shows a closeup of the first notch being cut. The arrow points to the metal nut I discovered was already buried about 1cm below the surface:


This picture was after I cut the notches for the left switchpack. The yellow arrows show the two-step notch and the buried metal nuts to attach the switchpack. The blue arrows point to the score line for cutting the notches for the right switchpack.


Here is a test-fit of the steering wheel controls migrated from my cruise control wheel to my original wheel:


I forgot to take a bunch of pictures during the process of making the Alcantara cover, but essentially here's what I did:

I undid the stitching that held together all the individual components of the original leather cover. This left me with 4 individual pieces of leather.

The pieces were very deformed from having been stretched over the wheel so they would not lay flat. I used a damp rag and an iron at very low heat to help flatten them down.
I then used the 4 pieces to make some templates of the shapes I would need for the Alcantara.

Alcantara is not a really cheap fabric. It costs over $100 per yard, so I didn't want to experiment with it. I wound up making some (many) prototypes using other fabrics and vinyl to get a feel for what I was going to have to do.

I did some research on Youtube on how to sew steering wheels. Youtube is a wonderful resource and I use it quite often whenever I want to learn a new task. There always seems to be some tutorial videos on just about any topic. Many videos are horrible, but I always come across a few gems that get me on the right track.

What I learned is that there are several stitch styles for steering wheels, the one I wanted is similar to what the factory did. Essentially you do a straight stitch along the opposite edges of the piece of fabric and then you zigzag another thread along the loops of those stitches to draw them together tightly.

Here is a diagram I found that details this:


You can do the zigzag through every loop or every other loop. The choice is based on the look you want and the length of each straight stitch loop. If the stitch is pretty long (mine was almost 7mm) you want to do each one, because skipping a loop leaves too big a gap.

This image I found on the web shows the BMW M-Style stitching in 3 colors. Notice the zigzag thread is skipping a loop.


This picture shows two other stitch styles. The one on the left is the one Aston uses and the one I chose for my wheel:


I decided to use a silver thread to accentuate the stitching on the wheel. My car has black stitching in the leather, but I figured the silver on the wheel would be complemented by the aluminum on the shift ****, surround, gauges, air vents, etc. so it wouldn't look totally out of place. Besides, it would look more sporty and custom. The problem with accentuating it, however, is that any screw-ups would be more noticeable. Mine isn't bad, but it's not perfect. If I pointed out some areas you might notice issues, but most people would never see them.

Once I was happy with my prototypes, it was time to do the real thing. In order to do the straight stitches, I used the original leather to transfer the holes and spacing to the Alcantara. I did this by hand because my sewing machines will not do a stitch that long or handle that thick a thread.

Here is a picture of one of the side pieces and the bottom piece stitched along the edges and then stitched together. This was a complex task due to the compound curves in both pieces.


Here is the wheel cover fully stitched and stretched over the original wheel:


Here's a look from the back side. Note that the cover needs to be glued to the wheel as well as sewn. I haven't done that yet in this picture:


Here is the cover glued down and part of the zigzag stitching done:


Once I was done, I removed the other wheel from my car, transferred the switchpacks over, then attached the newly-covered wheel, and replaced the airbag. I also took the opportunity to install my new shift **** while I had the car apart.

Thanks for reading along.

 

Whoa! That's quite a project!

 

That is SO impressive. That's a damn fine farkle. You're a bold man to dissect that steering wheel cover...lol