Spent the afternoon trying to find a gear knob for my bmw e36. visited almost all OEM suppliers. after no avail i decided to refurbish the old one. so here goes !
Materials required :
- Leather (not leatherite, wont give the same effect and will wear out much sooner). buy 3 times as much as u require.
sewing machine
thread
adheasive (samad bond)
sicssors
Lets start !
My old worn out knob.
take off the indicating marks. mine was just stuck on.
beneath was a screw holding the leather in place. unscrew it and take off the old leather.
measure out the aproximate piece you require. cut out a bit larger than you require.
get your mothers old sewing machine. put all the threads in. now this is the delicate part. if like me you have never used a sewing machine before, take it slow and easy. dont used an electrically powered one for this purpose since it will be much faster and difficult for you to handle.
turn the wheel by hand carefully inspecting each stitch as you go along.
i stitched the inner side of the leather so the stitches are not obvious from the front side.
once you are done try it on your knob. obviously it wont be perfect the first time, so you can make adjustments. if that does not work out you can always use the extra leather to make a new one.
Here is my first attempt. it was pretty good except that i made the top a bit smaller.
showing the stitching. not very easy but you can get there after a bit of practice. ( and i had my father to guide me through the process since hes done quite a few DIYs with leather products in his time)
once you are done with fitting, glue the extra leather in the knob, with wrinkles inside it.
make sure you stretch it so there are no wrinkels on the outer exposed area.
put the cap back in with the screw.
stick on the indicating marks on aswell. there you go !
now you have made your first gearknob, instead of just buying one.
a good learning experience plus you saved some money.(a new OEM knob would have cost aprox Rs.3000 )
if anyonw attempts this DIY do post pics here.