Freelander 1 Steering wheel suggestions invited

I don't offer invites often. The last time I did, the idiot who had pre-loaded showed up with his drugged up ladyfriend and they decorated my newly painted walls. Skills from RM days went into action after that debacle; they were lucky to escape with their lives. So go nicely please! You seem good sorts out there...

Now then, my steering wheel on the HSE I bought recently is awful. A picture tells the story and is attached. I think it is beyond repair and salvage. Cleaning it is one thing but the cracks in the leather are awfully deep. I wish I could stitch like them surgeons I saw on tv last night. I would buy an overhaul kit but my self confidence on it looking good afterwards is lacking.

I'm looking high and low for a nice leather, ideally single colour wheel on the usual sites and beyond. Even searching for new old stock. No joy.

I wondered what else might fit such as aftermarket, rover etc.

Any bright ideas please?? Apart from not inviting absolute knobs around for dinner and drinks!

That's just a normal high mileage wheel, but I know what you mean, it does lower the tone of your cars interior and it is right "in your face" being the primary control input. You've got a few options at ameliorating it:

• As you say you could go about sourcing a a new old stock or low mileage wheel, but I'm going to be honest with you those are rare as rocking horse droppings and making correspondingly strong money when they do turn up, think north of £300 for a new old stock wheel, and you've got the problem that most years on a freelander ran the colour "smokestone" as their off-beige mushroom colour, your facelift HSE is a later model and an exclusive ergo rare model and in a colour bespoke to that narrow timeframe and limited model trims, I believe the colour is called champagne, but I'm most likely mistaken.
• You could get it reupholstered, @kernowsvenski had a thread up a while ago making a grand job in refurbing his car's wheel with leather salvaged from a BMW in a breakers yard, help from his mother who is a seamstress/dress-maker to trade, and using the panels of leather from his original worn wheel to make the patterns. I recognised the colour as being BMW's beige from the late naughties, when I bought my '6 it was hard to find one that didn't have black+red or rich tea biscuit coloured, and later on when my uncle was looking at a 5, a great many were in that colour, I must have seen hundreds of bmw interiors in that colour, which while it burned my eyes, it's good news for you, as it's easy to get hold of that particular hue of leather for the reskinning of your wheel.
• A number of years ago I was overhauling my Discovery 200 series V8 offroader that had a three tone interior in it, a mix of cup of tea beige parts with the original nazi uniform "sonar" grey blue colour scheme interlaced with grey brown clay mud and green mold. I refitted the vehicle with seats an door cards from a 300tdi, everything fitted but the front seats needed subframe modificaitons, however, the dash, and more importantly the bulkhead fittings were different from 200 ---> 300, and so was the steering wheel fitment. To dance around tht I got hold of some paint that was extreemly coloured similar to the 300 door cards and sponge painted the dashboard and the centre of the original steering wheel in the new colour. We then ordered one of those tailor made sew-on leather covers you see on eBay. I gave the duchess a bottle of wine and she sewed it on in an evening while watching a girly flick and drinking said wine, she said it wasn't even that hard as this kit came with the holes in the leather already there, it was in her words "like lacing up a set of boots". That kit was relatively cheap, like box of beer money, might have been as much as bottle of spirits money, but nothing drastic, so it would probably be worth trying it.
• Another option is having it professionally "refurbed", basically in most cases someone will airbrush on the proper leather paints that have worn off and it will look like new again for another few years, but it will wear off. Probably looking at ~£100 for someone to do that either as an exchange or send your old wheel down to them. I think I have seen some people professionally doing the new leather onto your wheel like kernosvenski did, but again its strong money.
• There are a lot of traders doing steering wheel reprofiles, offering things like flat bottom, sports shaped grips, custom colours and materials, maybe look at that as an option? At least that way you know it's going to be pucka materials used and you can make it exactly how you want it.
• You can buy leatherdyes or paint's from people online, I've personally had reasonably good experiences on my hippo with dye bought on ebay from a guy up in caithness, plugging steve @ leatherdye caithness into google might get you the guys details, or do a hunt on eBay and look for a dude specialising in the dyes from that neck of the woods. To be fair to steve's dye, It still does wonders on my seats, but I suspect I was a little over vigours in scrubbing the steering wheel and didn't give it enough heat / time to dry in my freezing workshop, I suspect I'd have had better results with better prep on my part, and the reviews on his ebay lsitings substantiate this supposition. And I think I was meant to coat it with some wax/resin/polish malarky, instead it was "is it dry yet? - boosh - back in action"
• Another option is bolt on replacements.... I'm not going to pontificate on interchangeable wheels, but I can give you some pointers...
  • I know in a thread on here about an EV conversion they discussed borrowing an MGF steering colum as it's remarkably similar looking to a FL1 column, and is electric assisted, so you might get licky and be able to fit an MGF wheel?
  • A motor of similar vintage to the freelander would be the 75, and their wheels do seem to last longer than ours, but are bigger diameter and thinner rimmed. Not sure how the diameter would interact with the ergonomics of the lights/wiper stalks, and or the difference of diameter on the steering feel?
  • Assuming you find something that the splines fit on, you'd also need to consider the wiring of the airbag, and or linking out the steering wheel airbag to hoodwink the SRS system into not putting a red light on the dashboard.
  • But if you cross that bridge, and link out / bypass the airbag, you open the the door to a world of steering wheel options, get a momo/sparco type boss and there are catalogues of aftermarket six bolt steering wheels to he had. Some even look OEM, like the Momo "Millenium" I have on my MR2, on which the leather trim over the horn button conceals the 6 mounting bolts. Although you'll probably have to settle for black, as I don't think you can get many "champagne" leather covered sports 'wheels.
• The last option is a bit desparate dan, if you find a wheel you like that has the wrong spline on it, you can cut out the spline section from an old freelander wheel and have it welded into the new wheel. It must be said that if you do that you better be 110% confident in your welding and or have a professional weld it for you. Remember, a couple of sparks of chicken poop incorrect / inadequate mig weld might hold an exhaust together to scrape an MOT, but if that's holding the steering wheel onto the steering column, that wheel's coming off in your hands, and people will most likely die. But if it is done CORRECTLY, with a GOOD weld, it'll be as strong as if not stronger than original.

This is the thread on my retrimming exercise. It might prove helpful.
https://www.landyzone.co.uk/land-rover/worn-leather-steering-wheel-options.367949/
In the end was was really pleased with the result, but it was greatly helped with free access to a willing helper in the form of my seamstress mother and her machine skills.

Kerlaan said:

I wondered what else might fit such as aftermarket, rover etc.

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An MGF steering wheel will fit, but it is a bit smaller, but not by much.

Otherwise I'm sure there will be an auto re-trimmer locally that could re-trim the wheel for you.

Jayridium said:

That's just a normal high mileage wheel, but I know what you mean, it does lower the tone of your cars interior and it is right "in your face" being the primary control input. You've got a few options at ameliorating it:

• As you say you could go about sourcing a a new old stock or low mileage wheel, but I'm going to be honest with you those are rare as rocking horse droppings and making correspondingly strong money when they do turn up, think north of £300 for a new old stock wheel, and you've got the problem that most years on a freelander ran the colour "smokestone" as their off-beige mushroom colour, your facelift HSE is a later model and an exclusive ergo rare model and in a colour bespoke to that narrow timeframe and limited model trims, I believe the colour is called champagne, but I'm most likely mistaken.
• You could get it reupholstered, @kernowsvenski had a thread up a while ago making a grand job in refurbing his car's wheel with leather salvaged from a BMW in a breakers yard, help from his mother who is a seamstress/dress-maker to trade, and using the panels of leather from his original worn wheel to make the patterns. I recognised the colour as being BMW's beige from the late naughties, when I bought my '6 it was hard to find one that didn't have black+red or rich tea biscuit coloured, and later on when my uncle was looking at a 5, a great many were in that colour, I must have seen hundreds of bmw interiors in that colour, which while it burned my eyes, it's good news for you, as it's easy to get hold of that particular hue of leather for the reskinning of your wheel.

etc.....

Click to expand...

Thanks for your thoughts Jayridium, that is helpful.
I live in France and I have no neighbours for as far as you can see! It's nice. Downside is finding appropriate skillsets for this sort of thing.

I just checked in my decode of the VIN, the "Interior Trim Colours - Alpaca Beige Leather [TBK]"

Nothing do with this subject but I also noticed two other things in the decode: -

• Catalyst-ECD Directive - Catalyst ECD3 [067AY]
• Engine Tune - Diesel Engine Tune Europe [075CO]

I'm now wondering what difference those parameters are to other world locations, especially ECU. Probably won't matter, my 2nd hand unused RobBox just arrived.

Back to steering etc, I'm coded for welding and did contemplate a hub switch. But seeing the other postings, I need to reflect. I had seen @kernowsvenski posting and noticed he's offered his thoughts here too.

I will be sure to post what I do. Thanks again.

kernowsvenski said:

This is the thread on my retrimming exercise. It might prove helpful.
https://www.landyzone.co.uk/land-rover/worn-leather-steering-wheel-options.367949/
In the end was was really pleased with the result, but it was greatly helped with free access to a willing helper in the form of my seamstress mother and her machine skills.

Click to expand...

Thanks for linking this here, makes it a single point of reference for me. Seamstresses rock don't they?!

Nodge68 said:

An MGF steering wheel will fit, but it is a bit smaller, but not by much.

Otherwise I'm sure there will be an auto re-trimmer locally that could re-trim the wheel for you.

Click to expand...

Now that is very interesting @Nodge68 on the MGF front. Thanks for confirming the interchangeability mentioned earlier in this thread. It may be I can find one at a more reasonable price than an LR one and use it while I re-trim or modify mine. Or just use it.

@Nodge68, @Jayridium, @kernowsvenski, I just found a NEW leather MGF wheel in Germany for 99,00€ !!

Given the import duties now for anything from UK, this is most likely my route. Just need to call the people on Monday and check that the part is indeed NEW (call me a sceptic if you wish )

Kerlaan said:

@Nodge68, @Jayridium, @kernowsvenski, I just found a NEW leather MGF wheel in Germany for 99,00€ !!

Given the import duties now for anything from UK, this is most likely my route. Just need to call the people on Monday and check that the part is indeed NEW (call me a sceptic if you wish )

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Be aware that the airbag is separate from the wheel, and isn't interchangeable with the FL1 airbag, so you'll need an F one of those too.

Nodge68 said:

Be aware that the airbag is separate from the wheel, and isn't interchangeable with the FL1 airbag, so you'll need an F one of those too.

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Thank you @Nodge68

Well if you decide to go down the home retrim route, let me know. There are a couple of things I'd do slightly differently which would get a better result than I got on my first attempt. Happy to offer any input/support.

As Nodge says though, if you're looking at an alternative wheel, the airbag situation is the big consideration.

kernowsvenski said:

Well if you decide to go down the home retrim route, let me know. There are a couple of things I'd do slightly differently which would get a better result than I got on my first attempt. Happy to offer any input/support.

As Nodge says though, if you're looking at an alternative wheel, the airbag situation is the big consideration.

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Some days I wonder about whether I have reached the age where I can self justify treachery and being an outlaw. As in take the airbag out, fashion a sensor disable circuit and saw my 12 gauge down. But I was brought up proper. And I like things correct.

Thanks all, expect an update next week when I gather the facts, 'cos the facts NEVER lie.

Time for a fortified hot chocolate night cap! Laters friends.

Hey @kernowsvenski, can you see me wave to you from bretagne? Weather is similar, so maybe not. What a wet, misty one today.

Kerlaan said:

Hey @kernowsvenski, can you see me wave to you from bretagne? Weather is similar, so maybe not. What a wet, misty one today.

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Where abouts are you? Lovely bit of France that. I've got friends who live in a village near Morlaix and have sailed over to Tregier for for a few days. Cracking little city!

Hello @kernowsvenski, I'm between Carhaix-Plouguer and Callac. No streetlights. Lots of forest. What's a village?? LOL. About 30 minutes from Morlaix. Korrigans for friends...