Stan.Shaw@Excell.Net

I want to swap my GT steering wheel with a Momo one that I have. I have read some of the caution needed when removing an airbag steering wheel. I am wondering if a fault will be entered with the airbag permanently removed (like on my M3). If so, can it be bypassed?

P.S. I did do a net and Rennlist search without finding an answer.

AO

Stan, I'm pretty sure you will get an airbag light if you remove just the airbag. If you reconnect the airbag later, the ligth will probably stay on from what I've heard, but it shouldn't be permanent (i.e. forever). You will need either a Bosch Hammer or one of Theo's diagnostic computers to reset it.

Hope this helps.

Stan.Shaw@Excell.Net

Thanks Andrew, is there anyway to bypass the light being displayed as I plan to leave the airbag off. I am looking for a solution like the RDK bypass solution.

AO

The only one that I know of is to remove the light bulb - but even then, the digital display will still show a warning. There might be a way to jumper it, but I'm not familiar with it.

Kevin in Atlanta

You will get a airbag fault. Even after resetting with Bosch hammer the fault should re-occur upon startup.

AO

My point was that he could get the fault to go away if he re-installed the original steering wheel and then used a hammer to reset the error.

Nicole

Many years ago, Phil Tong did this conversion on a 90GT. He had to do quite a bit of modifying, including dremeling some of the plastic covers over the steering colulmn. In essence, it was a hack job to get the wheel installed.

I think it's critical for you to decide on whether you want to keep that car forever, or butcher it up in that area. Another alternative would be to get the TechArt Airbag wheel for the 928, or maybe doing a conversion like what Gary Knox did (996 steering wheel).

The trouble with the latter is that you have no idea, if that airbag deploys in the same fashion as the original one. It could be better than the old one, but it could also be larger or smaller and not give you proper protection - there is no way of knowing.

Remember that airbags are not "soft cushions" that magically unfold in front of you like in the slow motion clips shown in commercials. These things literally explode in a few miliseconds to keep you from hitting the steering wheel. After a second they are already deflated. They have to come flying at you with speeds of up to 200mph for a passenger airbag, in order to catch you in a colission. If the timing or shape of your aftermarket airbag isn't right, it could make the difference between life and death.

Personally, I would be inclined not to mess with this. My second choice would be the TechArt wheel that's designed for the 928. Gary's conversion loooks awesome, but see above, and no airbag would feel to me like giving away part of my life.

Decide for yourself!

Stan.Shaw@Excell.Net

Thanks Nicole, I appreciate your thoughts. Honestly I don't care for airbags. I have worn a seat belt for nearly 30 years and am only tempted to not wear it when I see a sign saying I "must".

I was presuming the base mounting for the steering wheel was the same as for prior years. If that isn't true then the setup I want to move from my 89 may not work.

I wouldn't want to dremel, etc. the car. I could swap the steering column parts from an older car, but I am not sure I need to change the wheel enough for that. My initial feeling is that I don't like the stock GT steering wheel. Perhaps I would get used to it in time.

Stan.Shaw@Excell.Net

By the way, I do plan on keeping the car forever, but I still wouldn't want to butcher it

Nicole

The non-airbag and airbag steering wheels on the 928 are not interchangeable. The hub is different. A few people here have done write-ups on installing other steering wheels in their cars - one is about putting an airbag car in an early model, and the other about replacing the current airbag wheel with one from the 996. Those write-ups might give you some ideas on the differences.

Another thing you can do is have Paul Champagne customize your airbag wheel to better suit your taste. I think it was Andrew Olsen who had this done, and it came out real nice!

Gary Knox

Stan,

Only a Porsche airbag wheel will fit on the GT, not a Porsche non-air bag wheel. As Nicole said - hub is different (both in size, and I think in splines on the shaft). The 993 and 996 wheels fit the hub (and in the case of the 996 wheel, it also puts the rim of the wheel about 1" closer to you, along with providing a horn that "beeps" by pushing on the center section of the wheel, rather than a button on either side of the wheel - which to me is a safety feature, as I'm not likely to find the button in an emergency!!). If you want, send me an e-mail and I'll forward the writeups on how to adapt a 993/996 wheel to a 928.
Like you, I always use seat belts, and in truly believe they are better for safety than the air bag.

Gary--

Stan.Shaw@Excell.Net

Thanks Gary & Nicole,

I did get some information on how to swap to an non air bag wheel, it does require using pre-90 parts. I may pursue this. I have no interest in retrofitting an airbag back into the car.

Garth S

If there's any similarity, I installed a euro M3 sport wheel on my E34: after disconnecting the battery and removing the oem wheel, I traced the airbag wiring down to a small ( orange) module. I disconnected this module from the main harness, and proceeded with the mod .... no airbag light.
If the 928 uses a parallel technology, there is likely an analogous communication module lurking under the pod ....

Jim M.

My son replaced the air bag wheel on his 89 951 with a MOMO wheel. He was able to fool the air bag control unit by installing a 3 ohm resistor into the air bag connector coming out of the steering column. The resistor made the control unit think the air bag was still installed. He did not get any warnings, and still retained the passenger air bag unit. The only other option is to completly disable the air bag system by removing the control unit.

Jim Mayzurk
93 GTS 5-spd

Stan.Shaw@Excell.Net

Thanks Jim, that is pretty much what I was told by someone as well, so it just leaves the issue of deal with the different splined hub, etc.