How to install steering wheel?

[dessertrat]

I've searched the forum and so far am not turning anything useful up. Several threads and a YouTube video on how to remove the wheel, but nothing on getting it reinstalled.

I got the old cracked steering wheel removed easy. Didn't even need a puller-- just unscrewed the nut (which came off with a 1 1/4 inch socket without the ratchet even connected! It came off by hand using the socket) and then wiggled it up, down, left, right, until I could see it was slowly coming off and then it came off easily after a minute or two of this.

I can't seem to get the new one back on. It seems to fit into the splines but won't go very far after that. I've tried tapping it all around with a rubber mallet for a couple minutes, and if it made any progress, it wasn't much. It's not getting far enough that the nut can reach the threads of the column. Is there some simple trick to this that's so easy nobody thinks to mention it? Or do I just need to keep going with the mallet a while longer? I don't want to mess up the splines or the new wheel. It got dark, so I will be trying again in the morning. Perhaps I wasn't getting it aligned like I thought.

 

[NDT]

Should go back on same way the old one came off. If some grease does not help, return it as defective.

 

[dessertrat]

So here's why it wasn't going on. There's a spring on the steering column that pushes back against the steering wheel. It doesn't seem all that strong-- I can compress it with the thumb and pointer finger of both hands-- but it is preventing the wheel from sliding down the splines all the way. I'm guessing that it has enough force that as I wiggle the wheel around with a lot of pressure trying to wiggle it back onto the shaft, it undoes the work on one side while I wiggle it on the other side. If I take the spring off the shaft, I can get the wheel 100% onto the splines in ten, twenty seconds, without using the mallet. I still can't make any progress with the spring on.

I can see the spring illustrated in figure 135 of manual TM9-2320-209-20P, but the manual part list seems to be missing most of the components from fig. 135 including this one, so I can't figure out its description, part number, anything. TM9-2320-209-3-2 does have steering wheel removal/replacement procedure but mentions nothing about the spring and says to use a mallet to get it on like I was doing. I suppose I'll keep trying with that method. Seemed like I was getting nowhere, but maybe I just need to try for longer.

So at this point my question is: what is the purpose of this spring? Will there be any significant consequences by keeping it removed? It must have been included for a reason.

 

[dessertrat]

D'oh. Turns out it wasn't the spring. I put the wheel on as much as I could and tried flicking the spring with a screwdriver and found it wasn't at all compressed. The steering wheel wasn't touching it. So I tried re-seating the wheel on the splines a couple more times, and it wiggled right on over the spring like it had before without the spring.

Pretty sure at this point I was just lucky enough not to have properly aligned the wheel on the splines each time I was trying to get it on with the spring and to have properly lined it up when I got it on without the spring. Once it was finally aligned whilst having the spring behind it, it wiggled right back on without a fuss.

To modify a popular IT support error code for this situation, this was a PEBSWAS error: Problem Exists Between Steering Wheel and Seat. Closely related to the ID-10-T (IDIOT).

 

[NDT]

The spring presses down on the upper bearing, it has to be there.