How are the signals sent to the radio, speed control, etc?

A. over wires that twist back and forth as you turn the wheel?

B. through wiper contacts on a commutator thingie?

C. by radio waves using a low power transmitter?

D. magic?

 

D. duh...

 

you forgot

E. all of the above

 

D.

/thread

 

A on the Z, its a little self contained box. I only know this cause i had to replace it. Do Not turn the steering wheel while the steering rack is disconected.

 

pass-through the SIR coil.

 

There's a collector ring in the steering wheel column that prevents the twisting of wires. This is the same principle used in cranes that allow turning of the upper structure indepentent from the carrier vehicle.

 

Certainly someone has removed the steering wheel, and can post some photos for us. How does the thing work?

 

Ok here we go.



The round housing you see around the steering shaft w/ steering wheel removed is called the S.I.R. coil or often called the clockspring. This is what houses the wiring that allows your airbag/cruise/stereo controls to pass through the steering wheel area.

Lets see if I can explain this correctly... each control switch (cruise/stereo etc) has a connector at the back of the switch. There is a small pigtail harness within the steering wheel that goes from the connector at the switches into a main connector that plugs into the SIR coil (that small rectangular spot on the round disk in the picture.

What is in the SIR coil and how does it work? The coil consists of a plastic exterior housing. Within that housing is 2 strips of thin flexible plastic which have paper thin, flat copper lines imbedded. These are coiled around in a circle and allow the steering wheel to turn back and forth to certain point. These can be broken very easily and should never be turned beyond the car's steering lock (do not turn the steering wheel with the lower shaft disconnected - if you turn it and go beyond the coils limit you will tear those contacts in the SIR coil) Now on the outside - you have a connector on the face of the SIR coil that is where the steering wheel harness connects, and you also have connectors on the back of the coil where your steering column harness connects.

Hope I explained that so everyone understands how it works a little better.

 

Are we be able to lower the steering column more than it can with little cutting work?

 

Anything is possible with enough time and money...

The column adjustment is fixed, it would take a lot of fabrication to alter the slide adjustment area. However, spacers could possibly be designed to space the column mounting points lower - but by doing so you would also be changing the steering working angle of the intermediate steering shaft. You would also have to redesign the dash to fit around it, and possibly have to change the seat track height because with the column lower you would also be changing the impact points of an airbag.

All in all.... not worth lowering the steering column IMO

 

My radio controls stop working. I switched out the old control w/ new controls and they still dont work. Any suggestions on how to fix? This one shop wanted to charge me $250 to fix it.

 

Your SIR coil may be bad, the go for about $130. You really need to get a multimeter and troubleshoot before you change parts. You could have a bad connection, bad switch , bad wire , etc etc etc.

 

There are not individual "wires" for each button, they are multiplexed (I believe) between only two wires. Each button has a different resistor value assigned to it, and this resistor is one half of a voltage divider circuit which allows the voltage to drop to a preset value each time a button is pressed. If your buttons quick working find these wires coming from the clockspring to the radio and check them with a volt meter. If you get no voltage at all chances are your clockspring is worn out or broke. If you are getting voltage changes there then trace to back of radio and recheck there.