Sunday 21 April 2024

Leather Parts for Claudette

Sometimes the spare parts for classic cars are rather surprising. When it came time to replace the sleeves that protect the steering rack underneath and hold all the grease in we had a choice of rubber or leather. The rubber parts were far cheaper (about quarter the price) but the price difference would have been more than offset by the cost of almost totally dismantling the front of the car, so we went with leather. Discussing it with our mechanic we reckon the lifespan of the sleeves will be about the same. But leather is definitely not a material one expects these days on cars apart from luxury seats. An added bonus of getting this work done was that we got invited under the hoist to check her out from underneath in the garage. The leather sleeves are the brown concertina tubes you can see in the middle of this photo.

Leather universal joint sleeves on a Citroen Traction Avant, France. Photo by Loire Valley Time Travel.


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