Yidney

So I sent my steering wheel off to Texas to have the leather redone - it was wearing out and has a small cut since I bought the car. I figured that since the wheel was off I'd pull my cluster and take off the lens and remove the dust that has collected in there.

The original owner had several things done that required the cluster to be pulled - probably by the same shop - parking sensors, a radar detector, and anti-theft system. So I discovered that whoever pulled it broke off the catches that hold it in. All I can figure is that they glued it back in. Can you imagine breaking the cluster on a brand new $75,000 car and gluing it in? So if anything ever actually goes wrong with the cluster I will have to cut it out with a dremel. I want to find this person and and put a bag of flaming dog poop on his porch.

Rudeney

LOL re: the dog poop!

As for the cluster, you could always just buy a used one and scavenge the plastic housing. have more than one spare from the C240 that I'd be glad to send if you want to try that. i think they are the same.

kryp

What shop in Texas did you go with and what did it cost you? My leather also needs to be redone but was wondering if buying a new steering wheel (from eBay) would be cheaper.

Yidney

Craft Customs near Dallas. They are online. Costs $450 if you want the original fancy basting stitching. You can save about $70 if you go with simpler baseball stitching. Don't believe their one week time estimate though. It will be more like 3 weeks. It's an all day job to do one, so $450 is not bad.

Yidney

Rodney, are the catches on the removable housing, or on the body of the cluster?

kryp

Thanks! Any particular reason you decided to go that route rather than buying one from eBay? Pretty sure I've seen cheaper prices there.

Yidney

Well, I would not buy a used wheel because that would sort of defeat the purpose of having it re-wrapped. I have the wood wheel, so a brand new one, even if one could be found on ebay, would be way more than $450. At the dealer it's probably close to $2,000.

kryp

Gotcha! I may just opt for a rewrap then but don't know if the 3-week time frame is feasible for me.

eteller

The leather on mine is fine but the wood is cracking . Probably going to swap it for an all leather one off ebay.

Yidney

Craft customs can redo your wood to match too. Ask them how much.

Rudeney

The catches on the cluster are on the plastic housing. It comes apart in two halves. The front part with the lens has the catches, and there's a rear plastic cover that the actually "meat" of the cluster sits in. Like I said, I'm not sure if the W203 housing will fit, but it sure looks the same. PM me if you want one.

Yidney

Good to know where the catches are. Thanks for the offers, but since there is nothing wrong with it, and it took me nearly 6 years to discover it is screwed up, I don't think I'll bother cutting it out right now. When I sell the car, maybe some kid I sell it to will say "first thing I'm gonna do is switch to white-face gauges" as he drives away and and I'll just laugh.

DanielFD

damn 450$.. Theres a guy here who does some leather work for a bunch of dealerships from BMW to VWs to Mercs. He takes 70$ here and a day of work! you guys should bring them here and have a vacation and it would only cost 200-300$ extra.