Right, I've not been completely hiding!
Rough time line, I decided to try to sort the steering wheel. The R - Sport wheels are a MOMO, so my following rants will be based around MOMOs build quality not Volvo's! Given how many of these are around, I wanted a proper job, so rang a steering wheel refurb shop. They were great, but were concerned that it might be a bit tricky. For all that it looks like the leather is stitched around the wheel that isn't the case. The white stitching is purely decorative and the leather is glued to a foam core. Their concern was that the foam was perished and would tear giant lumps off when the leather was removed. I could see their point, they were concerned I'd blame them but on the other hand, they clearly knew the pitfalls which made them the sort of people I wanted to do it. I did a test removal at home which seemed to go ok and the shop were up for giving it a go.
They were insistent I stayed in the shop whilst they removed the rest of the leather (again, understandable) which went ok... if a little scary. I could take my time at home, whereas they are a business. However, all was ok, it looked a bit scary, but they were happy to give repairing the foam a go and recovering. I drove home to pick up the wheel a week or so later.
The foam:
In the mean time, I had a phone call from them that it was harder to repair the leather than expected and could they have a bit longer and a few more pennies. The quote we were working to was prior to any work on the foam so I was happy with that, and they only charged an extra £15 so I was very happy. A week later I had a message to say it was ready, so drove up again.
I'm super happy with it. It's much darker in real life, same black as the original and the craftsmanship is superb.
The middle bolts were looking a bit rough at that point (rusty and hexs deformed), so got some of those on order
Happy with that. I might still look for the centre pad, not decided yet.