So today the Cam would hesitate to start and would cut out alot, So I said **** it and manually moved the wheels so I can get some room to reinstall the nose when I needed to afterwards.

So after heading in and coming back, I noticed the key cylinder would not switch all the way back and after some play it got stuck and wont move at all. This seems to cause the steering wheel to be in a crysis to get locked but with some force it unlocks again and you can freely move the wheel around but you get a clicking noise like its trying to lock itself.

What caused this and is there any fix? My uncles say its due to me manually moving the wheel since thats a no-no. I am really on a tight budget as it is and adding a new column would be a huge setback

 

did you put it back in park?

 

Thats the weird thing im saying to myself cause I dont remember ever switching it from park. To give some more info I had a party and pretty much when I went inside for the food and when I came back I noticed the rear lights were on and went inside to see what was wrong. I see someone played with the light switch and it was in Reverse? I try turning on the car but it did not have a charge. So I said ok let me turn it off and continue what I was doing and the key would not go back to the off and lock position. I played around with it for a bit and it just locked itself about half way between turning it on and off.

Can this be the ignition cylinder itself? It seems like it to me. Any help would be nice, its gotta suck replacing the column for a 4th time.

 

Ahhhh - NOW the truth be told!!! "PARTY" sums it all up - no further explaination needed!

{I'm teasing of course}

You said you moved the car "manually" - you would have had to take it out of park to move it at all. I'd try getting the key back to the on position (wiggle the steering wheel a bit while turning the key, then see if you can get the shifter back down to drive, the back up to park.

Even if it is the ignition cylinder, there's no need to replace the entire column - pop the steering wheel off and replace the cylinder. But first I'd try taking the center console top off and see if the neutral safety cable is bent, broke, or bound up (don't these have a cable driven mechanism as a safety that locks the key unless it's in park?). Or is there a safety mechanism that requires depressing the brake pedal to shift the auto?

 

Haha well I tried my best to keep all the damm kids out from running around in the garage, and when I went inside I left the garage opened and well I took too long to eat since I was very hungry.

I moved the car wheels not the car itself, I did move the car around in manual but that was 2 days ago when I needed more space to take off the front bumper and fenders off for re-prep.

I belive it does of some kind, but don't recall. I do remember having to place it in park to restart when ever it stalled on me a while ago.

I will have a look at it now, just finished eating and ready for some headaches, also isnt there a tool needed to take off the top part of the steering wheel assembly? I just want to know just in case its not the cable and I need to fix the column itself.

 

Heres a eh quality video showing the problems. Sorry if you cant make out what I say sometimes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlBvdI5Xq1c

Any help or knowledge to know before I tackle this later on today would be nice.

 

I'm no expert, but seems like you're right - seems to be some issue in the column itself.

Yes - you need a steering wheel puller - you can rent at Autozone/Advance.

It's been years since I had a steering wheel off - all I can tell you is take your time, look at everything closely to see how it connects and interacts, and watch for pieces that may fall out of place - especially around the turn signal lever and it's little plastic cam.

Might see if you can check/tighten any slop in the tilt while in there - there's an article here somewhere on that.

If you replace the ignition lock cylinder, you'll have to get the new keys cut based on the new plastic key that comes with the lock, but you'll have to get the same resistance pellet as the old key (I'm assuming you have VATS since you have an airbag). Ace Hardware makes VATS keys for about $25 each - way cheaper than the dealer.

Good Luck!

 

Well this is not a vats column, I replaced it with a 88 version if I recall. It only took some modding on the connectors to make the wipers and other things work and since I already bypassed vats it worked out. I already picked up a ignition cylinder for 13 bucks from Autozone.

If you are wondering yea I stuck on the airbag wheel on which the reason I went with a Grant one before was due to the horn not working but with some modding I made it work, but I recently went back to the stock since I really did not like how the grant looked the more I had it.

A neighbor of mine has the tool to do it, So I am just waiting for him to get home so he can loan it to me.

 

Yep it was the damm little cylinder! Its working now and the I now have a working Radio mode too now. Meaning the key goes back now to just turn on the radio. I was gonna replace the cylinder a while ago but decided against it, should of done it.