11/18/09
Steering Wheel and Draft Tubes

I received another steering wheel in the mail the other day for refinishing, so I got to work stripping the old finish off the wood. There were some light cracks to glue and clamp, but nothing out of the ordinary. One theory I have on how these cracks form is when the car is pushed (and old Ferraris are often pushed), steering and pushing the car puts stress on the steering wheel and the wood cracks. These are also thin rimmed wheels, so there’s not a lot of aluminum supporting the wood, so cracks will form with time.

It looks like someone stripped the old varnish off this wheel before, and a light coat of tung oil was rubbed into the finish. The original finish on these wheels was a high gloss varnish which sealed the wood pretty well. Without a good sealer over the wood, the oil and dirt from your hands tend to stain the wood. This also happens when the varnish cracks off. After stripping, I stain the wood to bring out the grain. You can see the stained wood at the top of the picture. Once the stain dries, I begin applying layer upon layer of varnish until the wheel is perfectly smooth and glossy, like it did when it was new.

While the radiator is out, I decided to work on some of the small details on my car. I collected an original set of road draft tubes that came off another car, and decided to put them on the330. The original tubes have a ribbed texture (top of the picture), and although reproductions can be bought by the inch, these used ones will work fine for my budget!

I installed vinyl hose on the the car years ago, and the crank case venting stained these tubes almost to match the ribbed hoses. They were just missing the ribbing.

The road draft tubes are secured to the filler necks with a cheney clamp, but the two NOS sizes I had in my stash were either too small, or too big. I know reproductions of these clamps are available, and will be fine for this application, but I’ve also heard the reproductions don’t clamp down as well as the original ones. Anyone have these problems?

Just a reminder, I’m looking for a new Vintage Ferrari Project. If you have, or know of a restoration project, please let me know. It would be great to restore another car on this website! My E-mail.

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