How-To: Refurbish an MSport Steering Wheel

[inkey$]

Bought a second hand M-Sport MFSW on here and am in the process of refurbishing it. Wasn't in too bad a condition, Standard rubber coating was starting to come away, and the leather was very dirty and quite cracked along the top of the wheel.



After reading a few threads on here, I'm experimenting with the plastics.

First tried using Dunlop 65 citrus oil (guitar fret board cleaner), which is good at making things less sticky, but didn't touch the sides with removing the rubberised coating these plastics come from the factory with.

Then onto using some IPA and much rubbing. Seems to be working but is a slog. Also finding it difficult to get in the crevices to remove the rubber in there too. My plan is to remove the coating, prime and respray all plastic parts with matt black.

Any tips to make the removal any easier? Picture below showing half and half.

 

[Usel]

Use the IPA, generous wipe over with a rag leave it on for 20 secs
Get out a credit card and scrape with it flat and just push forward. This will not remove it all so don't faff about trying to make it look pretty just give it a scrape all over.
As soon as finish that wipe it over with a rag. To get the loose off.
Now use some more IPA on another rag to remove the rest. Should now be coming off clean.

 

[inkey$]

Use the IPA, generous wipe over with a rag leave it on for 20 secs
Get out a credit card and scrape with it flat and just push forward. This will not remove it all so don't faff about trying to make it look pretty just give it a scrape all over.
As soon as finish that wipe it over with a rag. To get the loose off.
Now use some more IPA on another rag to remove the rest. Should now be coming off clean.

Great tip

 

[Usel]

Also I used 99.9% IPA.

The other .1% is to make it taste nice :rofl:

 

[smorris_12]

I think I found meths worked well when I did mine.

 

[inkey$]

Thanks too, Scott.
The plastics I've left on the wheel were a lot easier as I could get some purchase. I may not paint them and just leave as black plastic. Will see what sort of finish I can get and go from there.

 

[smorris_12]

I did mine in satin black and matt lacquer as I had it kicking around and am still pleased with the results.

https://z4-forum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=137897

 

[Usel]

Left as if seems to look good to me.
The windows switches have the same finish underneath as well if the coating is looking ropey on those too.

P.S don't blame me if they aren't because I only 'believe' as have yet to remove it from a set, but I will be when I get time

 

[smorris_12]

Yep, the window switch plastics are the same as the steering wheel panels.

 

[inkey$]

I did mine in satin black and matt lacquer as I had it kicking around and am still pleased with the results.

https://z4-forum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=137897

Great looking result there. Might have to follow suit. Spent the evening removing the soft touch so next step is to fix up the broken clips and lugs before maybe painting.

 

[inkey$]

Cleaned off most of the rubber coating and glued the lugs back onto the centre spoke. Not sure it will hold but to be honest, it looks like it only really needs to relocate into the wheel again and screwed in situ - the vertical tabs are still there so should help keep it in place.

Used an old Oyster Card to get into the nooks and crannies as a scraper which seemed to work well.

Next stage is to maybe prime and spray up all plastic parts, then sort the leather on the wheel out.

 

[Usel]

Those repaired lugs.
It looks like you have bugger all room when assembled back into the steering wheel but when I repaired lugs in my non sport steering wheel I was able to go to town with loads of hot glue to add extra support.
Remember once hard/cooled hot glue can be remodeled with a stanley blade, hot knife/screwdriver.
Also can the holes in the spokes be made any bigger to accommodate extra thickness?

 

[inkey$]

I’m hoping the front and rear of the centre spokes are robust enough to meet in the middle of the wheel and stay located as I re-screw together from the back. If not, then I may need to break out the rivet nuts.

 

[inkey$]

This is the kit I plan to use for bringing the leather back to life…

 

[grannyknot]

I went through the same procedure as you removing the rubber coating, previous owner had broken plastic receiving nuts so had to epoxy those back in.
I painted all the trim pieces but wasn't happy with the finish so this winter removed them all and covered them with black vinyl wrap, much happier with the results.

 

[inkey$]

I went through the same procedure as you removing the rubber coating, previous owner had broken plastic receiving nuts so had to epoxy those back in.
I painted all the trim pieces but wasn't happy with the finish so this winter removed them all and covered them with black vinyl wrap, much happier with the results.

Good shout on vinyl wrap, although I’m guessing the button units were tricky. I’m leaning towards not painting them at all actually. The finish is black satin so feels like overkill to prime, paint and lacquer.

 

[inkey$]

Does anybody know how these split side plastic parts surrounding the button units are removed? Don’t want to force them in anyway.

 

[inkey$]

EDIT: Figured it out. Credit card gently slid between the join and they come apart nicely.

 

[inkey$]

All plastics off and prepped….

 

[Rix]

Looking good! I'm on the look out for a mfsw - seems like I might to be cautious with buying one which is damaged. The silver finish definitely seems to be more robust than the later rubberised stuff.