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Thread: Classic 9 self-install leather for 40cm wheel

  1. #21
    Serial old car rescuer Arne's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by 911kiwi View Post
    As you will have discovered the leather needs to be longer on the back of the spokes to compensate for the extra curve.
    Actually, that's how I started it wrong. I also figured the longer flap for the back, it seemed to make sense that way. But when I did it that way, the back side flaps were too long and didn't match the front. That's when I called Classic 9 and was told the long flaps are for the front.

    Quote Originally Posted by 911kiwi View Post
    BTW Arne save yourself some time describing the technique. For those who want to learn the stitching tech go to the ESR article that Mike references on page one. An excellent how-to article by 911T1969.

    I'm going to write up a copy specifically for this kit. It will be simpler, and less daunting to read. And there are some things in that post that just aren't necessary or applicable to this kit.
    - Arne
    Current - 2018 718 Cayman, Rhodium Silver, PDK

    Sold - 1972 911T coupe, Silver Metallic; 1984 911 Carrera coupe, Chiffon white; 1973 914 2.0, Saturn Yellow; 1984 944, Silver Metallic

  2. #22
    Senior Member 911kiwi's Avatar
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    Yes, you are right - thinking about it, it is the front that has the step down for where the horn pad sits. A description specifically relating to this kit makes sense. I might try one for my friend’s 400mm wheel. Wonder if they do a 380mm kit?
    Kiwi
    1972 911S
    1967 912
    1959 356A Conv D
    Early S Registry # 306

  3. #23
    Serial old car rescuer Arne's Avatar
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    The job is done, the wheel is back on the car. On the whole, I'm pleased. It's undoubtedly not quite as nice as if I had sent it to Dallas Custom or Autobahn, but also not all that different, and at significantly less cost. Way better than some generic wheelskin product.

    Pros - Nice leather, generally good tight fit, well finished. Good price. Not too difficult, once you have the drill down.

    Cons - No instructions. Flaps for the spoke bases are cut just a small tad too large, have to fuss and massage the lacing process in these spots to avoid it being too baggy.

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    - Arne
    Current - 2018 718 Cayman, Rhodium Silver, PDK

    Sold - 1972 911T coupe, Silver Metallic; 1984 911 Carrera coupe, Chiffon white; 1973 914 2.0, Saturn Yellow; 1984 944, Silver Metallic

  4. #24
    Senior Member 911kiwi's Avatar
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    Very nice job. Looks great!!!
    Kiwi
    1972 911S
    1967 912
    1959 356A Conv D
    Early S Registry # 306

  5. #25
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    Arne -- Outstanding work!!!

  6. #26
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    Very nice, Arne. Thank you for taking the time to document your experience.
    Dho
    dho
    Central Florida
    Member # 1968

  7. #27
    Serial old car rescuer Arne's Avatar
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    Here's my process and thoughts. This worked well for me, but you may find ways to do even better. Give it a try, and don't worry too much about having to pull it out and start over. The kit comes with a lot of thread, much more than you need. I had mine half done once, found I'd messed up and had to pull it all back out to start over. I still had a bunch of thread left over. There is more than enough to do it at least twice. So don't worry too much about wasting thread.

    The kit also includes 2 needles, one curved and one straight. Contrary to what you may think, curved needles are not required so don't get concerned that you only got one. In fact, I myself found the curved needle was more difficult to work with. The only advantage I see is that if you have one of each style, it is easier to keep track of which crossing stitch goes first. More on that later.



    Start by identifying the front and back sides of the new leather. Look at the flaps that cover the spoke bases. On one side the flaps will be 4-5mm longer and the very ends will have a slight taper. The side with these longer, tapered flaps is the face side. The shorter flaps are on the back side facing the dash.

    Prepare the wheel by lightly scuffing or sanding the rim to smooth any imperfections. If your wheel was originally leather covered, try not to sand so much that you remove the marks where the original seams and stitching was, as they are a useful guide.

    Now identify the bottom (6 o'clock) of the wheel. If you, like me, are recovering a factory leather wheel, you should be able to see where the original seam at the bottom was and can use that as your guide. If you are covering a non-leather wheel, or you had to sand away the marks during the smoothing, you will want to measure to find the 6:00 position. Mark it gently if necessary.

    Now gently stretch the leather over the wheel, centering the bottom seam at 6 o'clock, and making sure the longer tapered flaps are on the front face side. Make certain that the flaps line up pretty closely with the spokes. In my experience, one or two of them may be off a touch due to inconsistencies in how the leather stretches. If it is off by no more than 3mm (⅛") you can probably work with it as you stitch closer to this area. More than that and you'll want to try to stretch the leather a bit now. You can use some masking tape to hold things in place after stretching. You are most worried about the two lower spokes at this point, you can fine-tune the upper spokes later.

    You will use FOUR start points for the stitching: the 12, 3, 6, and 9 o'clock positions. At each position you will stitch both counter-clockwise and clockwise, using a separate thread for each direction.



    You will start at the bottom, where the new leather is stitched together. Measure off 2m (6½ feet) of thread, and put a needle on each end and get ready to lace it up.

    You will be doing a cross stitch on the rim, changing to baseball stitch as you go up the spoke sides. Start with either pair of holes closest to the sewn seam.

    Code:
        5  3  1   1  3  5
        •  •  • | •  •  •
                |  
                |   
        •  •  • | •  •  •
        6  4  2   2  4  6
    Take one of the needles and go DOWN through hole 1, straight across and UP through hole 2. You now have an end coming up out of holes 1 and 2. This first part is under the leather - the straight across stitch will be invisible when everything is pulled tight.

    Time for the first stitch. You can start with either the odd numbered side, or even, your choice. But note that you want to do it in the same order all the way to the base of the first spoke so that the stitches are all crossing the same each time. Also, you can go either direction on the rim, clockwise or counter. I will be doing counter-clockwise here, but the process is the same either way.

    Take the odd-numbered needle (hole 1) across and DOWN through hole 4 and back across and UP through hole 3.

    Code:
        5  3  1   1  3  5
        •  •  • | •  •  •
                |  \
                |   \
        •  •  • | •  •  •
        6  4  2   2  4  6
    Now take the even-numbered needle (hole 2) across and DOWN through hole 3, across and UP through hole 4.

    Code:
        5  3  1   1  3  5
        •  •  • | •  •  •
                |  \/
                |  /\ 
        •  •  • | •  •  •
        6  4  2   2  4  6
    Now you have threads coming up out of holes 3 and 4.

    A couple of notes at this point. Don't worry about trying to keep this first stitch pulled tight at this point. It takes 2 or 3 stitches in series before there is enough drag on the thread to keep them tight. You can work on this soon. Also, when doing the second half of the cross, you will be pulling the thread through holes that already have a thread in them. Make sure you do not thread your needle through the thread already in that hole. If you do, when you snug up the thread and pull it tight the thread will rip. If you pull the existing thread lightly to the side, you can thread your needle away from the prior thread. It sounds harder than it is, just thread with care.

    Repeat the last bit, first going 3-6-5, then 4-5-6.

    Code:
        5  3  1   1  3  5
        •  •  • | •  •  •
                |  \/ \
                |  /\  \
        •  •  • | •  •  •
        6  4  2   2  4  6
        
        5  3  1   1  3  5
        •  •  • | •  •  •
                |  \/ \/
                |  /\ /\
        •  •  • | •  •  •
        6  4  2   2  4  6
    With the threads now coming up from holes 5 and 6, grab the threads (not the needles) and pull them tight. It may help to pull the under-stitch (number 5 in this example) first, then the over-stitch. Pull hard, watch to make sure the first stitch gets very tight. The second stitch will loosen a bit when you relax, but that's OK for now.

    Continue the cross stitching, pulling very tight after each pair of cross stitches. Note that it is important to ALWAYS cross the same thread over the other. i.e. the odd thread always goes over the even thread. Also check every 3-4 stitches to make sure your seam is nice and straight. These tips will make a difference on how the stitching looks.



    Stitch the seam to the base of spoke and stop there. You will continue up the spoke later. I wrapped the thread that I wasn't working with around a spoke and taped it out of the way for now. If you only have 2 needles, you'll need to remove them from the thread ends to use on the next section.

    That next section will be half of the small area between the spokes. You will go from the center of that area down to the spoke that you just laced up to. If you started at 6 o'clock and went counter-clockwise, you will start at 3 o'clock now and go clockwise to the same spoke. (If you went clockwise from 6, you will start at 9 and go counter now.)
    Last edited by Arne; 03-27-2022 at 09:02 PM.
    - Arne
    Current - 2018 718 Cayman, Rhodium Silver, PDK

    Sold - 1972 911T coupe, Silver Metallic; 1984 911 Carrera coupe, Chiffon white; 1973 914 2.0, Saturn Yellow; 1984 944, Silver Metallic

  8. #28
    Serial old car rescuer Arne's Avatar
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    Cut off a thread of 1m (3 feet) this time, and thread on the needles as before. You will do the same process as the last section, but 2 notes to consider. First, since there is no sewn seam to use as a starting point, you need to be careful to find two holes that are straight across from each other. Find the hole on one side of the leather at the corner where the spoke goes up, and count over to the mid-point (approximately) between the spokes. It doesn't need to be exactly the mid-point, you can be off by a hole or two as long as you also use the same count on the back side. Stick one needle in part way to hold the spot. Do the same count from the corner hole on the other side as well. Count carefully, maybe more than once. If you miss it won't be obvious until you approach the spoke, and then you'll have to unlace and start over. Once you have identified the matching holes, treat them as holes 1 and 2 above.

    The other note is that you will now be lacing the opposite direction, so you will want to reverse your order of lacing. If you did odd side first before, now do even side first. This will make the crossed stitches look the same as the first section.

    Follow the process as above, and again stop when you get to the base of the spoke.

    It is now time for a decision on which side of the spoke to stitch up first. Take a close look at how the flaps of the leather line up on the spoke. Generally they will be off by just a touch. If so, you will want to lace the side that has the least overlap first, to help pull the flaps into place better. Change the needles to the other threads if necessary. (If your flaps are nicely centered, just leave the needles on the threads they are on and do that side first.)

    Before more stitching, you now want to glue the flaps down to the rim. Use a good brush-on contact cement (I used Weldwood Original). Pull each flap back gently (don't worry if you loosen a few stitches, you can pull them tight again later), and brush some glue on the concave face of the spoke base, and a little on the inside of the leather flap as well. Let it air dry for a few minutes and smooth the flap down carefully. If your flaps are slightly offset to the spokes, you can gently stretch the flap towards the tighter side. Do the same on the back side of the wheel as well.

    Now you can continue to stitch up the spoke. The stitch changes to a baseball “>>>>” stitch.



    Look at the above hole diagram. If you picture the base of the spokes as the starting position holes 1 and 2. The odd-numbered thread will be coming up out of hole 1 and the even-numbered thread up out of hole 2. Take your even needle across to hole 3 but come UP through the bottom of hole 3, and then your odd needle across to hole 4 but come UP through the bottom of hole 4. Continue with the even needle across and UP through hole 5, then to odd needle across and UP through hole 6. You can see in this stitch, the needle always goes UP through the holes after a crossover. Pull these stitches tight as you go. When you get to the end of the spokes the thread ends will be coming UP through the last holes. Now take your either needle and go directly across the the adjacent hole and go DOWN through it. Then take the other needle and go directly across and go DOWN through that hole. Now the threads will be coming out of the inside of the last holes. This is your last chance to work your threads tight and to get all your seams tight. Take your time and work it tight. When tight, tie couple of half hitch knots in your threads. Pull the two threads to the backside of the spoke, cut them about 20mm (¾") long and tuck them in the back. Use a tooth pick and some more contact cement to tuck them in.

    Thread the needles on the threads on the other side of the spoke and repeat the process. Once you have tucked the ends of these threads in the back side of the spoke, you have one last task here. You will need to put some contact cement just inside the ends of the spoke flaps, let it set up, then push the end of the leather down to the face of the spoke. Do this on both front and back.

    You have now completed 25% of your wheel. The remaining 3 quarters will be the same thing. A couple things to note here. When starting a new quadrant next to one you have already done, don't skip any spaces when you lace through the first two holes. Use the same exact holes where you started before. For example, at the 6 o'clock spot start where you did before and do the first crossing stitch right over the seam.

    Code:
        5  3  1   1  3  5
        •  •  • | •  •  •
               \|/ \/ \/
               /|\ /\ /\
        •  •  • | •  •  •
        6  4  2   2  4  6
    Also make certain to watch the direction of the crossing stitches to be consistent over the whole wheel.

    That's pretty much it, I think. Take your time, don't hurry and it will turn out all right.

    Last edited by Arne; 05-16-2020 at 04:42 PM.
    - Arne
    Current - 2018 718 Cayman, Rhodium Silver, PDK

    Sold - 1972 911T coupe, Silver Metallic; 1984 911 Carrera coupe, Chiffon white; 1973 914 2.0, Saturn Yellow; 1984 944, Silver Metallic

  9. #29
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    excellent work Arne
    And thanks for taking the time to explain how it's done

    ... I will be ordering a kit ...
    ... to while away the long winter evenings in Sydney ...
    Paul

    1969 ex-South African RHD Tangerine 911T . 1970 ex-Southern Californian LHD Conda 911T 1955 Series 1 86" Land Rover (original Australian CKD … very slowly re-building) 1987 W124 230e
    (long term paid up member)

  10. #30
    Serial old car rescuer Arne's Avatar
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    One last thing to mention. You will need to call or email Classic 9 to order this kit, as it is not (as of now) listed on their website.
    - Arne
    Current - 2018 718 Cayman, Rhodium Silver, PDK

    Sold - 1972 911T coupe, Silver Metallic; 1984 911 Carrera coupe, Chiffon white; 1973 914 2.0, Saturn Yellow; 1984 944, Silver Metallic

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