Thread: Steering wheel spins freely, what broke?

Steering is bolted to rack which is bolted to the firewall.
How far did you drop the cradle?

Edited: Now that I think about it I think the rack is bolted to the cradle.

Intermediate shaft....basically the shaft that connects the steering column to the rack.

That would be my first guess.

Maybe 99XC600 is right. Intermediate shaft.

Intermediate shaft! Mine popped out while driving

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Reattach the coupling.

Looking at your firewall from inside or outside, see that big rubber/plastic boot that the steering goes through? Ok.. Right at the spot where the firewall is..there is the steering rod with two flat sides coming down from the column. Then there is a slide with a baby torx head set screw that should ride in a groove on the shaft and keep it together. When you lowered the cradle, the rack put enough pressure on the slide that it came apart. It doesn't happen often..but it can happen.

The way to fix this..
Take an 11mm socket and pull that boot up off the rack. Remove the bolt holding the knuckle/universal to the rack. Now in your hand is the knuckle that has the slide side on it. Loosen that torx set screw. Now for the painful part. Without being able to see it you want to slide those two pieces back together, then put th knuckle back on the rack and reinstall the 11mm bolt. You'll have part of one hand to do this with and it'll see impossible. The easy way to do it is get a buddy and a razor knife. Hop under the dash and cut yourself a nice access slit into the boot. Buddy can now hold the knuckle or be inside the car to talk you through aligning the two pieces. Once you get it, tighten the set screw and duct tape the boot. Drink a beer..you earned it.

I let racks hang all the time and this typically doesn't happen. Dagger's car did this to me twice (cradle was dropped about 10 times) and I was able to get it back together by myself w/o cutting the boot. Crbqust's did this also and it took the two of us about two hours to get it back together with a nice access slit in the boot.

I did it with two people, I had my friend lower the cradle using a jack and I was under the hood reconnecting it. Much Easier

That is exactly the part of the shaft that I was talking about having come apart.

I forgot that you likely would have to lower the cradle a little. I did it on Chris's but not on Mikes. You can do it with two people w/o taking the shaft off the steering column with two people in the way I described it. The only potential issue you have here is if you turned the steering wheel too far when they were disconnected, it would damage the clock spring. You'll know once it's back together if that happened, because your airbag and steering controls won't work.

yeah i hope you didn't spin the wheel around like a kid on an amusement park ride, or you just tossed out a nice chunk of money, the clock springs not cheap.

Originally Posted by BillBoost37

That is exactly the part of the shaft that I was talking about having come apart.

I forgot that you likely would have to lower the cradle a little. I did it on Chris's but not on Mikes. You can do it with two people w/o taking the shaft off the steering column with two people in the way I described it. The only potential issue you have here is if you turned the steering wheel too far when they were disconnected, it would damage the clock spring. You'll know once it's back together if that happened, because your airbag and steering controls won't work.

I turned it a few times, then back to where it was once I figured out it wasn't working. Any way to check this besides putting them all back together? Which steering controls are you referring to, like the stereo controls? If they work now that means I'm good?

just make sure you have the wheel back to where it was when you started, if you went 2 full turns in any direction or less you should be ok, if you went more than 3 full turns good chance its toast.

the clock spring is located under the steering wheel, if you broke it your airbag light will come on and your radio controls for the steering wheel will not work.

so if none of that happens you'll be ok.

Originally Posted by aeidian

So if my airbag light isn't on and my radio controls work, I'm fine, right?

correct!

not that ive seen here.

i did mine, it wa sin a regal, close enough tho.

you need to remove the battery cable first. then remove the airbag from the wheel, how you remove it on a gp i dont really know.

the take the steering wheel off, you will need a puller to get it off. also un clip the radio controls before the wheel comes off. and the horn ground, you push it in and tun it, it comes right out.

then take the plastic off the top and bottom of the column, regal had a torx screw on the bottom and the back side was kinda a hinge clip. gp im not 100 % sure.

now that all that's out of the way, you will see the clock spring, it has a spring clip holding it in place, remove that and it comes out.

at the bottom of the dash, where the obd2 port is, if you look next to it, you will see a yellow plug and a black plug right next to each other, un plug them both, those are from the clock spring. you may need to take the lower plastic and steel knee bolster off to get the zip ties cut off the old clock springs wires from the rest of them, mine had 2 zip ties holding them all together.


once out it looks like this.