I am wanting to take the square looking steering wheel out of my 86 and install a wheel with a round horn button, can i do it?

 

I hope so. It's not a difficult job, but I know know your skill level. On a scale from 1-10, it might be a .5 minimum needed!

Just pull off the horn button, take the center nut off, borrow the puller from Autozone & put your new one on!

 

Is it possible? Of course it is.

Can you do it? I don't know. I don't know you, or your abilities.

Anyway, just get a steering wheel puller, remove the center bolt and clip, unhook the horn wire, hook up the puller, and pull it off. Install it backwards of the removal. You don't need the puller in order to re-install it. Just tighten the nut until it wont go any further, but dont go crazy with the tightening.

 

Beat me to it!! ><

 

im not that stupid bud, simple question should get a simple answer, not some smartass comments.

 

Somebody has a zero sense of humor....

 

it's not as simple as that.... I know because I've done it

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here's the tricky part.... The mechanicals for hooking up the horn are NOT the same. you're going to have to mod a connector to grip the contact point that sticks up toward you from the steering column, connect a wire to it, and then connect the other end of it to the cap. It's not hard, and once you get in there you'll see what I'm talking about. Let me know if you need more specific help once you have it apart

 

Agreed.

 

too bad both you guys were wrong...

 

Actually, I'm not.

I've never had a 3rd gen. with a working horn, so that part never bothered me.

Whatever you say.

 

some people consider horns an important feature, especially when almost ever city in the country requires them in order to pass inspection.

Just because you choose to run your car around with a major safety feature disabled, don't give bad advice to others to lead them toward your half-a** methods. After have experinced your lack of attention when it comes to safely shipping parts, it doesn't surprise me at all that you would give out bad advice.

Stephen has an excuse... he's a firebird guy, and the wheels are different. you should have known better, but you piled on this guy anyway

 

Saw that coming a mile away.

I don't give "bad advice".. Ever. It is a simple overlooked detail that he would have seen when he went to reinstall the wire, and would have no-doubt found a way to make it work, regardless. Your always awfully quick to point fingers and make bad of an otherwise good person. Some people can take a joke, and some can't, thats the way it is. But, some people are jokes...

 

How are they different?

Horn button pops off.
Single wire for the horn.
Single nut tightens the wheel down, but requires the puller to get off.

 

you were wrong then, just like you're wrong here and now.... the difference is at least this time you have somewhat admitted it.

I wouldn't have said anything if you didn't go out of your way to make this guy feel stupid for asking a legit question

 

there's no wire on the rs wheel... there's a steel pipe thing that contacts with a flat metal sheet on the backside of the horn button...

 

does anyone have a step-by-step with pictures on how to do this?

thanks

 

I didnt try to make anyone feel stupid. It was a joke, which obviously went over your head. I have said all I needed to say.

Save it.

 

i think the original poster would say you DID try to make him feel stupid. In fact.. he did

you owe him an apology

 

Than I would say that he is just as ignorant as you are. The only apology I would owe him is for fueling your need to clutter his thread with useless crap that in no way helps the task at hand. For that, I say sorry.

 

that's the reaction I expected you to have... par for the course

 

OK, but the funny part is, that while I have a Firebird now, it is my first 'bird & I've replaced many Camaro steering wheels, just of later years. All had the single wire, as I described. Probably more of a year change thing, than a Camaro vs Firebird thing.

 

If that was directed at me, since it was posted after my question to you....How did I make him feel stupid? I simply said it was a fairly simple job, which it is, once a person looks inside.

I'm not going to apologize, when I said nothing wrong & just because you took it the wrong way.

 

it was not posted to you, but you both poked fun at him for asking such a "simple" question, and in fact, there was a big part of the job that neither of you knew about.

It's nice to know what you're in for before starting any job, no matter how small. the way you made it sound the job is as simple as swapping out 3rd gen seats for 4th gen seats. In fact, there is a small bit of fabrication needed in order to make the conversion.

the fact is, he asked a reasonable question, and I thought he deserved a complete answer, based on experience.

As to what you're talking with the different year models... I have an 1985 assembly manual, and an 89 car and they are exactly the same way, no wire. I guess by later you might mean the 90-92 cars, but with the air bags, all bets are off for what kind of systems those had.

 

Hello evilemokid94!!

Torque the steering wheel nut to 30 lb-ft when installing it!!!



This is probably the best advice on this whole thread, besides the answer "yes", you can do it!!!

 

I don't, but if I need to I can take my horn button off and take a photo of the wire harness fabrication I did.

That's the only tricky part. go borrow a steering wheel puller from autozone, and go to work

 

Here is the best thread I can find that relates:

https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/inte...eel-grant.html

Just ignore the 4 screws on the back, yours won't have them. Also ignore the airbag related items, as yours wont have those either. Follow up to about the middle of Post #2.

 

that's a great thread, but 99% of it doesn't apply to a pre-90 base model. The only helpful picture in the thread that applies to his situation is the one that shows how to hook the sterringin wheel puller up to the column

evilemokid, ignore the rest, and let me know if you need a pic of the fabrication for the horn wire I did.

 

nevermind.

 

I dont remember having to do anything to the horn connector when I replaced the stock rectangular wheel with a Z28 three spoke round one in my old 88 sport coupe

 

The square center steering wheels use a metal pin from the cancel cam to a metal framework horn switch that's part of the steering wheel hub. The horn pad presses the frame work, which activates the horn.

The Z28, Berlinetta, etc round hub steering wheels have the horn switch on the horn pad, and a ~3" wire from the pad to the cancel cam.

The pin setup is old school GM. If you order the pin from the dealer it has instructions telling you how long to cut the pin for various applications dating back to the 60's.

 

thats random?

 

he had a longer post about you should have done a search for help first before asking for help, but he must have realized that a search on this topic wouldn't have turned up much.

I did many searches before tackled mine, and I never found anything about the special problem with the horn wire

 

No, I did not. You should know me better than that by now. You just took my post that was directed to him, that way.

 

I attenpted to swap a square wheel onto a IROC column once. ( had round wheel originally.) When I tried to install the square one I could not get it "down" on the column far enough to install the snap-ring.

The actual Cancel Cam itself is different. I'm pretty sure it's a white plastic cam on round columns and green plastic cam on square columns. At the time it looked like everything from the cancel cam & up would need to be swapped,......... I had no time then so I just stuck the ratty IROC wheel back on rather than completing the swap !

 

I had something else written, then changed my mind. Some things just aren't worth it.