Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Finally got the wheel off!!!

  • Replaced steering wheel with Nardi wheel
  • Resolved another Leyland mistake: that hideous rubber covered steering wheel
  • Gained access to turn signal/ light control
  • Much easier removal of dashboard (to fix lights and such)
Finally, after MONTHS of trying, I was able to get that horrible Leyland style rubber steering wheel off! Well, it wasn't me as much as it was a colleague of mine who also happens to have an interest in classic cars.

I tried various tools: hub pullers, hammers, tons of penetrating oil, a puller I made like the one from Moss (which sells for $50), etc, but all to no avail! In fact, conventional wheel pullers will not work with this car. Rather, the remedy was simply persistent pushing and pulling the wheel from side to side. Just keep working the wheel gently. Don't use a hammer (I managed to damage the threads doing this). It took about half an hour, but in the end the damned thing came off! Despite drenching the thing in Deep Creek, hardly any of the oil had actually gone down far enough to actually loosen up the splines.

I can't take credit for the work, I'm not patient enough to do anything like that. All credit should be directed to my colleague and future car collector, Matthias (see picture).

So basically: trying to take the steering wheel off? Forget about buying anything! Nothing works. Trust me, I've tried it all. I even bent the old wheel in the process.