Aftermarket Steering Wheel for 5th Gen
 

I was brainstorming future projects today for the monte and I started thinking about how much I dislike the oem steering wheel. The wheel itself is in good shape, but the material feels cheap and the airbag has the bulky mid-90s look.

I've found two wheels I like:
-Momo Nero
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B003OC1QTU/ref=mp_s_a_1_14?qid=1445999315&sr=8-14&pi=AC_SX110_SY165_QL70&keywords=Momo+steering+w heel+suede
-Sparco suede
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B000ECPZAY/ref=mp_s_a_1_10?qid=1445999080&sr=8-10&pi=AC_SX110_SY165_QL70&keywords=Sparco+steering +wheel


Anyways, I had some questions for those of you that may have done this before:
-Did you use a long or short adapter? I like the factory wheel position and would like to add a quick release.
-Did you go with a big name adapter or an off brand?
-For the quick release, has anyone used an off brand like NRG? Im not trying to be cheap here, but a sparco quick release is like 4x the price of an NRG. Where I have a bit if a hard time is that it costs more than the wheel itself does. If I had to pay almost $500 shipped for a real sparco, I think I'd rather do without since I can think of a lot more things the car could use for that kind of money.
-Were you able to use your stock clockspring for the horn?

I have used some thing similar for a 98 cavalier I had. I am afraid to do the same to my monte. because it looks to intimidating for my liking because of the airbag set up. is a little different from the two cars. I didn't want to attempt. there should be some one here should chime in. there is a couple of things I want to do to my monte before jumping in on a different steering wheel.

Curious what you mean about the airbag being intimidating?

Are you saying it's hard to get off or are you worried about the function of the system with an airbag removed?

I will just delete both airbags when I do an aftermarket wheel.

More info about airbag deleting...
 

Hi. I was wondering how this project went. I have an aftermarket wheel I want to put on my '06 Monte, but my two concerns are the airbag notification and the fitment of the adapter. Do these cars have the same size spline as the older pre-airbag Chevy's?

It didn't unfortunately, stock wheel is still in there.

Around the time of the original post I shifted my attention back to performance stuff instead by focusing on more engine mods and DIY front coil overs. Once I wrapped those projects up, I started spending my mod time on my C6 instead of the monte.

I'd still love to do this at some point, but its pretty low on the list at this point.

Airbag light will stay on, youll have to remedy this somehow.

Theres only a couple adapters I found that match the spline and theyre expensive. I tried several others I thought might work but didnt.

Don't they make a plug in airbag emulator for GM?

I never looked into it for my 5th gen because its just a simple light bulb to remove. But for the 6th gens, I wonder if theres an emulator out there that would work.

Jumping back into this thread to see if anyone has any new information.

What I found out since then was that the standard Chevy adapter that you would get from Grant to fit any pre-96 Chevy is slightly bigger than the spline of the shaft in the post-96 Chevies. They shrunk the spline just enough that an adapter won't grab it. I contacted one of the makers of aftermarket parts like that, and they said that an adapter for this size was "unavailable." I never cleared up whether it was unavailable from them, or anyone.

So I've been entertaining a variety of ideas to make an adapter fit, including enlisting a friend who is very talented with a welder. I thought about trying to make an adapter out of the center of a stock wheel.

Yes... there may be legalities and insurance issues with such a modification, but if that becomes an issue for me, then this is easily reversible.

Flaming River makes adapters for 2000+ years.

I never did touch it. Id intended to go back to modding my monte after I got done with the C6, but then we moved into a major fixer upper. So I've been buried up to my eyeballs in house reno projects the last few years.

Would still love to change the wheel at some point, but its probably down in the triple digits on the priority list of life, lol.