OEM Nardi Steering Wheels for Dummies...

[My5ABaby]

Would this work on a 2nd gen?

[War Eagle]

My 2002 Miata wheel showed up today and it is beautiful! Just about mint condition so I am very happy. All for $62 too! I'm now in the process of sourcing an airbag to fit. Any other sources for this than eBay?

[Brent]

Check the miata and protege forums. I think I have www.miata.net listed on first page, that one use to have some pretty good deals on them.

[War Eagle]

My 2002 Maita/Protege wheel came in and it is as promised, in near mint condition so I am very excited. I paid a whopping $62 for it off of eBay. There are a few others available but not at that price. I pm'd the seller with a lowball offer and he accepted. Tough economic times mean our gain

Good call Brent on searching the Miata/Protege forums for airbags. I just found an airbag in very good condition and closed the deal this morning. Cost? $50 shipped! So my total for the new steering wheel swap will be $112. Beats the heck out of buying a used Nardi RX7 wheel as they go for over $300 with most in the $400 range.

As mine is a Miata/Protege wheel (search eBay for each of these and you'll find others), I'll have to drill out two holes at the 12 and 6 positions but I think I can do this. For cruise control to work, I'll need to connect two wires together off of the wheel to the one on the RX7 wiring, but I can handle this also I think. Jesus Padilla is going to help anyway.

As an aside, I found the airbag on http://www.mazdas247.com/forum so you might want to check there for used steering wheels. There are a few right now with the airbag that appear to be in good shape for a good price.

A few shots of the wheel (I haven't cleaned it yet so what you see are smudges not scrapes). I wanted one with perforated leather after seeing goodfellafd3s:









And the airbag:

[Brent]

Good stuff David, I'm glad it all worked out for you. Can't wait to see it installed.

[djmtsu]

I need to get one of these steering wheels for the Miata. If you guys would stop stealing them from me!!!!

[War Eagle]

Originally Posted by djmtsu

I need to get one of these steering wheels for the Miata. If you guys would stop stealing them from me!!!!

Here is one for you:

http://www.mazdas247.com/forum/showt...ighlight=wheel

[War Eagle]

My airbag showed up today. It's in pretty good shape, with some small scratches on the flying m logo. The black plastic cover is fine with no scratches and the black of the airbag matches the black of the wheel.

Pics:







I reflecting on what to do about the scratches on the emblem. Options:

- nothing. Once it is installed on the car, you'll never really notice the scratches.
- paint it. Thought about masking off the black areas on the logo and repainting the "chrome" portion. Problem with this is all chrome paint I've ever used doesn't exactly look like chrome and I'm just not sure. Another thought I had was to "black out" the logo by painting over the entire logo. The flying m logo has ridges in it defining the "m" in the logo and this would show through the black.
- swap the cover out. Minimally I'll call Ray Crowe and see if I can source the cover only. Think I can but this is big bucks.
- swap the bag out with my wife's. My wife has a 2003 Miata with the much sought after Nardi wheel on it and her airbag cover is pristine. Should I ask her if I can have her cover?

[War Eagle]

All the pieces to my project came together and I am very happy with the results. Will install the wheel on the car in a few weeks once I am back from vacation.

As a recap, I bought a Miata/Protege wheel off of eBay for $62. I then sourced an airbag for $50 off of a Mazda forum. I didn't like the scratches on the aluminum Mazda plate/badge on the front of the airbag so I decided to retrofit a 3D Mazda flying M logo on the wheel. I bought the chrome emblem for $20 and then scoured a carbon fiber insert for $18 total. Total cost for the wheel and all parts - $160. Compare that to the $400 - $800 for a RX7 Nardi or Spirit R wheel.

First, I removed the logo and found this:



I then used a razor knife to cut out the plastic middle. Sliced my fingers a few times before I found the best way of doing this - gloves and a putty knife to protect the airbag. Here is the result:



A few of the nicks around where I cut out were due to my stupidity but they don't show at all under normal light so I am okay with it.

I then cut out a plastic disc the size of the hole and used this as a mount for my chrome emblem. I used silicone adhesive to affix the chrome emblem to the plastic disc and I used two-way tape to affix the plastic disc and emblem to the airbag. Note I also used silicone to affix the disc to the airbag cover so if the airbag deploys, the chrome emblem and airbag cover will deploy properly. Finally, I bought a rubber o-ring and used this as a "sealer" around the chrome emblem. The o-ring gives the emblem a nice finished look. My end result?





Again, the flash magnifies the scratches I caused with the razor knife and also the dust on the emblem. In person, it looks great and I really like it. Will take pics once the wheel is installed.

[prrex4ever]

Nice, good job. Very original.

[War Eagle]

Originally Posted by prrex4ever

Nice, good job. Very original.

Thanks. Can't wait to install it on the car.

[War Eagle]

FYI - There is a killer deal on a Miata steering wheel on eBay. The wheel is $39! Looks like it is in okay condition. Might just need cleaning.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/MAZDA...#ht_573wt_1591

Buy one of the airbags and you are good to go for under $200 total. That would be a steal.

[War Eagle]

So I now have the wheel installed and am loving it! For me, it's a very nice upgrade to something more modern looking.

Before:


After:


As I have previously posted, my total cost for the wheel, airbag, and new modified Mazda center emblem was under $160, compared to $400 - $800 for new FD wheels. I also have working cruise control which I don't believe is available on the FD wheels.

I want to thank Brent for his write up which was invaluable to the wheel install. We reused all of the old FD connectors to make the job easier. All connections are crimped and Raychem shrink wrapped. It did take us about 2 hours to complete the job. As we wanted to reuse the old FD connectors, this took some time to be careful so we didn't damage them. We then had a bit of an issue fitting in the FD connectors into the back of the Miata airbag. The FD connectors are pretty large and are positioned to the lower left of the FD wheel in a space that is not available on the Miata wheel. With a little cutting of the FD connectors (the parts not used by the Miata wheel) we did finally get it all to fit. I guess it might have been easier to cut the connectors off and just splice the wires together but I think we ended up with a nice OEM quality job.

Pic of Angel, Kilo worker, reading Brent's instructions:


Side-by-side comparison of the FD wheel on the left to the new Miata wheel on the right. The Miata wheel is smaller in diameter to the FD wheel and IMO feels much better when driving:

[War Eagle]

FD connectors on the Miata airbag:


More connectors:


Snipping plastic connector pieces so it will fit:


Note the trimming on the top part of the blue FD connector:

[War Eagle]

Installing the wheel:


Bolting the new wheel on. The FD wheel came off easily. We just wiggled it off:


That's it!