90's airbag steering wheels. UGLY!

[Timewaster]

The part of the car that you see, touch and feel the most must be the steering wheel.

 

My on/off obsession with the idea of an XJ40 on my driveway means I spend a lot of time on ebay looking at this ugly rump:

There are some attractive prospects on ebay, but Im not sure I could live with that wheel. Would it be feasable to retro fit an earlier wheel?

 

Got me thinking...

 

The Rover 800 from the same era is equally unappealing:

 

Vauxhall made this horror:

 

Even Porsche made some seriously nasty wheels (Not that I am troubled by the notion of a 964 on my driveway):

 

Any other awful examples spring to mind?

[Ben_L]

This absolute buttock from Top Spec Mongdeo's and Scorpios was a pet hate of mine. The CC buttons just really piss me off...

 

#

 

And if that wasn't bad enough, from the same people...

 

 

Honda didn't make a good job of it...

 

 

And when I had a Xantia, I dreaded this grey slab of horse meat.

 

[Wilko220]

 

The Rover 800 from the same era is equally unappealing:

 

From memory, the 800 steering wheel doesn't even have an airbag in it.

[Spiny Norman]

There are some attractive prospects on ebay, but Im not sure I could live with that wheel. Would it be feasable to retro fit an earlier wheel?

 

Are there not MOT issues with a car that should have an airbag when it doesn't have one? Is that not why you can't just rip the whole shebang out when the warning light comes on and fit a nice Moto-Lita?

 

Looking back at some of the cars I've had over the years, I can't honestly say that the airbagged wheels are any worse than the regular ones, I think it's just wheels in general have been getting uglier...

 

No bag in the truck like Volvo 240

 

..or in the Saab. This is a really nasty wheel, ugly and plasticky. If decent ones weren't £100+ I'd swap it.

 

Merc E class, with airbag. Looks OK and nice to hold, if a bit on the big side.

 

One of the nicest wheels I've had recently, complete with airbag, the Alfa 156.

[Ben_L]

 

The Rover 800 from the same era is equally unappealing:

 

From memory, the 800 steering wheel doesn't even have an airbag in it.

 

Some do, some don't. From about 94 they came as standard, but the buttock shaped wheel (As pictured) looked similar from 91 to the end of production, with or without inflatable pillow.

[Split_Pin]

The Alfa wheel is lovely indeed.

 

I quite like the 90's Ford 3 spoke ones though, mainly because they were blobby like the rest of the car!

 

Vauxhall Airbagged wheels of the 90s were really awful looking though, but you got a HUGE bus-like one on a Corsa if you didnt have an airbag. This one is like mine:

 

 

Which is still better than the Airbag one:

 

[Ben_L]

The Alfa wheel is lovely indeed.

 

I quite like the 90's Ford 3 spoke ones though, mainly because they were blobby like the rest of the car!

 

Vauxhall Airbagged wheels of the 90s were really awful looking though, but you got a HUGE bus-like one on a Corsa if you didnt have an airbag, like mine:

 

 

 

If we're talking wheels without airbags, the Corsa Boggo two spoke (And to a cetain extent the three spoke of similar design) looked utterly crap.

 

I really don't know what they were thinking, but it looks about as strong as a twig.

[Lord Sterling]

 

The Rover 800 from the same era is equally unappealing:

 

From memory, the 800 steering wheel doesn't even have an airbag in it.

 

Some did, some didn't, I think they were some sort of option in the early 90s, then Rover made them standard for all 800s, this is my steering wheel on the mk2 Sterling which is slightly later than the above wheel:

 

 

This is the mk1:

 

[warren t claim]

IIRC, the early 90s Vauxhall airbags were the full sized 80 litre jobbies where wearing a seatbelt was probably unnecessary as opposed to the smaller eurobags fitted to Fords of that era. I think 90s Ferraris sold in the US had enormous steering wheels as well to cope with a full sized airbag.

[bub2006]

i had 2 l plate rover 414. early l didnt have airbag, later l plate did. srs light was actually on the steering wheel. my s plate 600 was ugly chunky wheel, i think similar to 800 series. great car to drive though

[Magnificent Rustbucket]

The part of the car that you see, touch and feel the most must be the steering wheel.

 

My on/off obsession with the idea of an XJ40 on my driveway means I spend a lot of time on ebay looking at this ugly rump:

There are some attractive prospects on ebay, but Im not sure I could live with that wheel. Would it be feasable to retro fit an earlier wheel?

 

Its only the '93 and '94 model XJ40s which have this abominable hideous dreadful airbag steering wheel. It's utterly revolting, I agree. Unfortunately one blights the inside of mine. I've kept it because I reckon it makes the car safer. Quite a lot of people have changed it though - generally for the Momo wheel fitted to the earlier XJR cars.

 

The airbag on the XJ40 is a self contained explosive unit with no associated electronics. Once removed there are no residual parts and the car has no airbag light. The unit is deactivated by turning a screw on the rear of the airbag.

 

The only thing to watch for IIRC is that you get an adaption to fit the horn button on the centre pad. I believe the 1990s XJ-S non-airbag wheel can be used if fitted with an adaptor (the number of splines is different); this has the horn buttons on the wheel. I'm fairly sure I have come across someone who has fitted the 1986-1992 non-airbag wheel to a later car - he needed to fit the earlier horn on a stalk indicator stalk though, so lost the computer on a stalk function of airbag cars. There are one or two threads detailing the airbag car to XJR steering wheel swap on http://www.xj40.com . There is even a thread in which someone fits an airbag wheel to an early car.

 

Of course, any 1986-1992 model XJ40 has no airbags.

 

This is mine. The horror of of it. The horror.

 

 

 

Got me thinking...

 

...Any other awful examples spring to mind?

 

BMW: not great!

 

 

Mercedes: slightly better - but everything is relative!

 

[ashmicro]

Can't find a pic of one, but I was once offered an "Astrali" steering wheel, which "might fit your Escort". It was one of those horrible mk2 ASTRA pov-spec ones, with the big pimply rubber horn push. Even the steering wheel that Stirling Moss modified with his head looks better than one of those.

[Madman Of The People]

Early US-spec Alfa Romeo 164s had this hideously ugly airbagged wheel.

 

[Pete-M]

They sorted the wheel out in the XJ reasonably quickly. The one in my XJR is at least leather trimmed.

 

[Joseph]

As much as I love my Volvos...

 

Volvo 400 series, No Airbag:

 

 

Volvo 400 series, With Airbag:

 

 

The square on the bottom right of the wheel boss reads 'Volvo SRS'.

[Pillock]

At the moment, there is no requirement for the airbag to work... I removed the airbag from a Mk3 Golf and it MoTed fine. Not sure if there's anything in the works, I heard rumours that the airbag and light were going to be testable but I'm sure one of our testers here can comment on upcoming changes...

[chaseracer]

These are what I look at:

 

 

 

Blingo has a space-hopper, but there are too many other things in the Dyane waiting to kill me to worry about such things...

[Magnificent Rustbucket]

They sorted the wheel out in the XJ reasonably quickly. The one in my XJR is at least leather trimmed.

 

 

The X300 wheel is much nicer, but unfortunately it uses a completely different (electronically triggered) system, so won't work in an XJ40. If they did, I'd have an X300 one in mine straight away!!

[345DL]

This monstrosity on L and M registration Escorts always struck me as if airbag technology took them by surprise, and they didn't actually bother to design a proper steering wheel to encase it:

 

If we're talking wheels without airbags, the Corsa Boggo two spoke (And to a cetain extent the three spoke of similar design) looked utterly crap.

 

I really don't know what they were thinking, but it looks about as strong as a twig.

 

I was always surprised in the late 90s when Vauxhall and Peugeot didn't fit airbags to their poverty-spec Corsas or 106s, it's as if those buying such lowly specs didn't deserve the same chances of survival as those who stump up the extra cash for a more plush version of the same car. I think the same applied for VW Polos and Fiat Puntos.

[Pillock]

There has to be differentiation between low spec and higher spec models though - if you bung airbags on them all, then you have to find other things to add to the Popular to make the Popular Plus, then the L, then the LX etc.

 

Personally I'd like to see a return to the days when base model meant base model, rather than "just like the De Luxe but we left off the heated sunvisors"

[Wilko220]

Personally I'd like to see a return to the days when base model meant base model, rather than "just like the De Luxe but we left off the heated sunvisors"

 

I have to agree. It does seem ridiculous that it's pretty much impossible to buy a new basic car these days.

Perhaps low second-hand car prices have destroyed the market for such base spec vehicles?

[chaseracer]

 

However...

 

http://www.dacia.co.uk/vehicles/sandero/explore/

 

[Lacquer Peel]

Base model cars are an enticer to get people to buy more profitable specced-up models.

I think Dacia will make it quite difficult to buy an 'Access'.

 

As far as I can work out, steering wheel airbags were introduced to save the lives of Septics who refused to wear seatbelts.

[willswitchengage]

Ever wondered where DENNIS the council recycling lorry goes after he's done his round?

 

 

Also, did Defenders ever get airbags? They got bulbous steering wheels.

[oldford]

The airbag light will be testable but not in quite the way that you'd think. If it indicates a fault with the SRS system (it is illuminated), it'll fail, however there will be no requirement for it to illuminate or follow a set sequence, so you can get it fixed by removing or blanking out the bulb.

 

A missing airbag, where one was fitted as standard will be a fail.

[purplebargeken]

Those steering wheels are just plain ugly. Oddly I never really took much notice until now. Mrs. PBK bubble Micra has a bulbous steering wheel and it hasn't even got an airbag! Again it is povvo spec.

[Lord Sterling]

Mrs. PBK bubble Micra has a bulbous steering wheel and it hasn't even got an airbag! Again it is povvo spec.

 

Yes, this is mine:

 

[John F]

Vauxhall made this horror:

 

 

I don't mind it.

 

The droopy pre-airbag wheel fitted to Cavaliers was much worse (although the pre-airbag Calibra wheel was sporty & nicely proportioned). The later Vectra airbag steering wheel was AN MUNTER in comparison, like most things on the Vectra.

[CortinaDave]

Its annoying if they're planning to make it an MoT requirement, as I'd imagine most 90's cars airbags will be borked by now anyway. IIRC you're supposed to replace them every ten years which no one ever does so even if it did go off it'd be a soggy sad useless fart rather than bursting out with life-saving urgency. May as well just have an airbagless wheel.

 

RE: cavaliers... posher spec CDi and SRi spec J and K reg ones up until the airbag introduction had this wheel which I always thought was much nicer than the later one with the bag, or the weird bulbous thing you got in the pov spec.

 

[Pillock]

As airbagged cars get to 15-20 years old, surely it's safer to have no airbag than one that's "out of date" and could go off? I'm not sure of the internal construction of them but if they were originally designed to last 10 years, I'm sure they need retiring at some point.

I'd be quite happy to yank the airbag out, tape over the light, and roll like that.

 

As for the yanks and not wearing seatbelts - do they have different airbags to us? I'm sure I've seen videos showing how effective an airbag is with a seatbelt on, and how effective it is without and without the belt it caused massive amounts of abdominal damage - because the driver was already moving towards the bag and windscreen when it inflated.