mike1261

Has anyone managed to do anything to prettify/modernize the steering wheel in the 98-02 Fbody's while retaining the air bag functionality?

I see one of the site sponsors has beautiful napa leather wraps for the steering wheel. I love the smooth feel of perforated napa on the R-Design sport wheel in my 2015 Volvo.

However, the wrap looks a bit out of place in contrast to the heavily-grained giant rectangle of an air bag in the middle of the steering wheel, and the textured leather has a lot of wrinkles in it that detract from the clean finish of a modern wheel.

Has anyone come up with a solution to modernizing the stock wheel, or a swap to a newer style wheel that retains airbag (for sure, not "maybe but you'll find out in a crash if it worked or not" lol) and steering wheel controls?

I was thinking of sanding down the grain and dying/painting it to hopefully have a smoother finish, or filling the grain with some kind of filler and then plasti-dipping it.

Any ideas or pics of what people have done?

VIP1

Have you seen this thread?
https://ls1tech.com/forums/appearanc...el-f-body.html

Not necessarily a done deal, but good info.

mike1261

Yeah I came across it in my travels. Definitely great info! But I'm not a risk taker enough to guess at whether or not an air bag will work, so just trying to see if there's a nice way to refinish what the car came with if there's no direct replacements.

The re-covering in napa leather looks nice from the redline goods folks, I just don't like how it makes the rest of the wheel look dated and crappy lol.

eb110americana

iTrader: (4)

After my build is complete, I have plans to splice the center hub from my stock wheel with a smaller aftermarket rim. I will unpack the airbag and make a new cover for it, and wire in my own steering wheel switches to the stock boards. After it is assembled, I will have an upholstery shop wrap it in alcantara/microsuede.

I seriously hate the factory steering wheels in the later F-bodies. I refer to them as "the goat turd" steering wheels, as the buttons like turds being excreted from a goat's butt. The wheel's rim is also ridiculously thin, which became even more painfully obvious after driving my truck for a while.

AnotherWs6

iTrader: (17)

That's my biggest issue. I know it it isn't pretty, has that same goofy styling all Pontiacs had in that period, but what I hate is how thin it is. I don't want anything race car looking. I wonder if a wheel could be re-covered just to make it thicker. But I suppose that would make it grow in diameter as well.

AnotherWs6

iTrader: (17)

https://ls1tech.com/forums/appearanc...g-wheel-5.html

eb110americana

iTrader: (4)

If you can live with everything else, but just want a fatter wheel, I would do this. My truck has a steering wheel cover on it, and even being the shitty off-the-shelf one that the previous owner put on, it feels about 1000 times better than the Trans Am wheel. You can probably get one of those custom, do-it-yourself stitched-on covers. If you want to add a lot of thickness, an upholstery shop can add some additional padding before making a cover.

You could probably even leather wrap the airbag cover, but I suggest perforating the leather to tear, should the airbag deploy.