Disintegrating leather steering wheel....possible cure

[John and Barbara Mallick <mallick@netheaven.com>]

Osman Parvez wrote that his leather steering wheel was disintegrating
into a black sticky mess when wet.  I had trouble with that in my old
'84 4kq and solved the problem to my satisfaction by using good old Kiwi
paste shoe polish (I think I had a can of brown).  I originally tried
cleaning the wheel with some saddle soap, but that made things a lot
worse.  In desparation, I rubbed it down with a liberal coating of Kiwi
shoe polish, rubbed it in good, waited a few minutes for it to dry, and
then buffed the result with a soft cloth.  I did this once or twice more
and ended up with a very nice finish on the wheel and no more stickiness
or black goo.

Marty Liggins has the car now...maybe he can  tell me how the wheel is
holding up?

Just my $0.02 for a cheap fix.

John Mallick
'91 200q