Series 2 steering wheel home repair resin convert

[jagnut66]

Hi,
The other day, much to my annoyance, I discovered some fresh cracking to my 'good' steering wheel, caused I suspect by my steering lock (some homemade padding required there methinks.....). So, as the cracks were small and I have read up about doing this before I decided to have a go fixing them with some Araldite resin, whilst the steering wheel is removed from the car, ironically, so it doesn't get damaged whilst refurbishment / welding is going on......
Anyway, I set about repairing this one and noticed after that I had mixed too much up and had a large quantity left over, so I eyed up the original wheel hiding behind the chairs in the living room, badly cracked and, I thought, beyond the abilities of a 'back street tinkerer' like me and decided "why not?"........
I have mentioned this steering wheel before, in another post, enquiring about getting the frame stripped and remade, however for those who didn't see that, this is the damaged wheel 'before':

Cracked bakelite steering wheel 1.JPG (644.15 KiB) Viewed 1093 times

Cracked bakelite steering wheel 2.JPG (661.12 KiB) Viewed 1093 times

Cracked bakelite steering wheel 3.JPG (629.12 KiB) Viewed 1093 times

Needless to say the cracks were deeper than they looked at first and swallowed up copious amounts of Araldite over two sessions of filling, a day to harden, light sanding with wet and dry, more filling and left to harden for a day for a second time. This was followed my a final good sanding down, before I cleaned it off and gave it a light wipe with 3 in 1 oil.
Why?
Well having cleaned up / restored some period art deco bakelite handles for my home, I read somewhere that it was good for the bakelite, kind of like 'feeding' it. Don't ask me but it works for the handles in the house........
I then gave it a polish with some Autosol, which is usually excellent for cleaning / polishing bakelite items (as my black bakelite '50s telephones can testify to).
However I felt I needed something else with the steering wheel, something more 'fluid' that I could wipe round it, so to speak. And I came up with this marble polish that I had left over from when I reinstated my bedroom fireplace (cast iron bedroom fireplace, marble hearth):

Series 2 steering wheel repairs 5.JPG (850.19 KiB) Viewed 1093 times

It wipes round and polishes the steering wheel a treat.

Series 2 steering wheel after repairs.JPG (1.2 MiB) Viewed 1093 times

Below are the repairs themselves:

[jagnut66]

Series 2 steering wheel repairs 1.JPG (1.32 MiB) Viewed 1090 times

Series 2 steering wheel repairs 2.JPG (660.61 KiB) Viewed 1090 times

Series 2 steering wheel repairs 3.JPG (1.34 MiB) Viewed 1090 times

Series 2 steering wheel repairs 4.JPG (1.34 MiB) Viewed 1090 times

More work polishing is needed I think and I know, even then, this will never up to professional standards, however I'm posting this up to show what can be achieved at home, even by a novice like me, with a little time, effort and patience.
Go on, give it a go, if I can do it......
Also this is a marbled steering wheel, where repairs will always show to a degree anyway.
A black steering wheel could be repainted after the repairs, to hide them further.
And I now have a usable spare steering wheel for the future......
Right back to the polishing......
Best wishes,
Mike.

PS: I will also be repainting the gold centre, now I've repaired the wheel itself it's bugging me......

[stevey]

Excellent job, well done!

[jagnut66]

Well, the centre has now been rubbed down, cleaned and repainted, plus I have been giving the wheel a further polish.
I think I have taken it as far as I can and I have to admit to being quite pleased with it.
I feel I have taken it from junk to usable, which was the point of the exercise.
Also, as noted in the title, I am now a resin convert.
I would now be happy to attempt this again and actively encourage those with a dodgy wheel to give it a go before spending a fortune with a professional restorer, unless you are aiming for concourse of course.
That said, I reckon a black steering wheel could be done to an even higher standard by the home restorer, simply because you can cover your work better with a respray.
I have to say I love the marbling on these wheels, oddly though all the professional jobs I have seen, where the wheel is stripped of the original bakelite and remade in a mould, all seem to be of a plain colour and not marbled......
Are they still able to reproduce this effect?

Series 2 steering wheel repairs 6.JPG (1.32 MiB) Viewed 992 times

Masked off and sanded / cleaned, ready for paint......

Series 2 steering wheel repairs 7.JPG (1.33 MiB) Viewed 992 times

Gold once more and polished up again.

Series 2 steering wheel repairs 8.JPG (1.31 MiB) Viewed 992 times

The one area that will never be perfect but it's an improvement on how it was at the start of this (if the wheel was black you could loose an area like this better).
Best wishes,
Mike.