After catching sight of a Series 3 with a nicely leather finished steering wheel on Instagram I got to thinking…

The Series steering wheel is a nominal 20mm in thickness, excluding the “nobbles” on the back, that’s quite thin and isn’t all that comfortable to hold on long journeys. Plus in summer, when its hot, hands get sweaty and grip is reduced.

I thought about some bike handlebar tape; its self adhesive, designed for sweaty hands and pretty indestructible… but wouldn’t look right.

The Instagram post gave a name of an eBay shop with excellent ratings, so I bought an Italian made leather steering wheel cover.. Search for “Mr Steering” on eBay. (I’d embed the link but that’s too hard for the new WordPress editor)

First a couple of measurements…

Lower half of the steering wheel is a nominal 19mm in diameter (excluding the nubs on the back)
The top half is approx 1mm thinner. This might not sound like a lot but I can feel the difference. Obviously the previous owner held the speeding wheel correctly. Seems to have gone out of fashion !

Fitment…

Instructions are comprehensive and there’s even a helpful you tube video
The leather cover is supplied with a decent sized needle and more than enough heavy duty nylon thread to do the job
Cover is offered up
Lower section of the wheel fits very well with the beads meeting where they should
Although it doesn’t show up so well, the bead on the upper half (and narrower part) of the steering wheel would overlap. Once stitched up, all this would be loose. Not a good combination for a steering wheel.
Fortunately, I had a roll of fabric tape. The top half of the wheel was given a couple of wraps of this to thicken it out a bit
To join both sides together, I thought I would have to push the needle through the holes made when the bead was stitched together.
What actually happens, is you stitch between the loops of the bead stitching. Much easier.
It was going to be a lot easier to do this with the steering wheel removed… in the garden… with a beer… on a Friday evening.
First section done and fitting nice and tightly
Operations continued after cooking dinner, this time with a glass of wine and a copy of B2L to prevent scratching the table

Fast forward 12 hours or so….

Stitched all the way around and refitted to the steering column. I drove the car today and it’s super comfy to hold.

Some detail shots: