Steering wheel splining

[Ruairidh Dunford]

Ali Sutherland did the exact modification to a deep dish steering wheel casting from John Barlow in the same way you describe Bill. I can put you in touch with him if you like - the process was simple and worked well.

[AllAlloyCup]

Hi Ruairidh 

That would be an ideal contact , I met Ali at Guildtown and 
there wasn’t much about Austin 7’s  he didn’t know.

Please txt me or email his details.( or just send my details to him?)


Regards

Bill G

[Ruairidh Dunford]

Ali is a phone man - will get his number to you.

[Hedd_Jones]

Not as nice visually (actually very yuk indeed). But a Ruby wheel will give you most of the 'dish' you need, and comes with a suitable spline.

I recoln it would get you back on the road PDQ as bugger all cost.

[Keith Dobinson]

hey all.  I did one 20 years ago with a drill press and dividing head, Just make a tool the shape of the spline, fit to the drill press, and cut it by hand. Might take a few hours but you will get there eventually.

Keith Dobinson

[dickie65]

There are new Type 65 and Nippy steering wheels being made so the tooling is out there.
contact Willie McKenzie

[AustinWood]

I used an unmachined casting for the steering wheel boss of my Nippy. My local machine shop cut the spines for me. They used the technique described by Keith. Broaching is needed for producing large numbers but requires capital investment.
It worked well.

[Chris KC]

A broach is little more than a tapered spline with periodic grooves for chip removal - much like a thread chaser. As long as the spline material is harder than the material being cut I would have thought it could be done using an old spline suitably modified and a fly press.

[AllAlloyCup]

Hi Chris

That’s our current thinking , modifying an old column
To a short version of a professional broach, plus
Hardening it and using a hydraulic press.

Regards

Bill G

[Amilcar John]

Aren't the early columns (for the deep dish wheel) shorter than the splined columns? You may end up with the wheel rim rather close to you. I would agree with Tony's suggestion which shortens the column and removes the spline problem.

John