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Locked Steering Wheel on Civic

A

Azndude51

Platinum Member
My mom just locked her steering wheel on her 01 Honda Civic. She can't turn it, I remember this happening to my dad's car a few years ago, but I forgot how to unlock it. Any suggestions?
 
Had similar thing happen in wife's 626. Had to crank the wheel some to get the lock to engage, then we couldn't turn the key in the ignition. We had to pull on the wheel a bit to get the key to turn.

Of couse we learned this from the 50$ visit from the tow truck guy.
 
Originally posted by: BrokenVisage
Originally posted by: Heisenberg
Yeah, if you can't get the key to move, turn the wheel one way or the other a bit.
Click to expand...

..and while the wheel is turned THEN turn the key, happened to me too.
Click to expand...
Well yeah, I kinda assumed that part was obvious. 😛
 
Originally posted by: Heisenberg
Originally posted by: BrokenVisage
Originally posted by: Heisenberg
Yeah, if you can't get the key to move, turn the wheel one way or the other a bit.
Click to expand...

..and while the wheel is turned THEN turn the key, happened to me too.
Click to expand...
Well yeah, I kinda assumed that part was obvious. 😛
Click to expand...

don;t assume anything... remember who you are dealing with
 
I have deep concerns for some of you interacting with the world around you should you ever exist without access to an internet connection.
 
Originally posted by: forcesho
why doess this happen anyway ? i had it a few times but dont know what cause it
Click to expand...
There's a metal disk on the steering shaft with a bunch of semi-circular cutouts in it. When the wheel locks, a metal pin extends through whichever cutout is right above. When you turn the key the pin retracts, but sometimes the wheel locks in a place where it puts sideways tension on the pin and makes the key hard to turn. If you turn the wheel a bit it releases the tension.
 
Originally posted by: Heisenberg
Originally posted by: forcesho
why doess this happen anyway ? i had it a few times but dont know what cause it
Click to expand...
There's a metal disk on the steering shaft with a bunch of semi-circular cutouts in it. When the wheel locks, a metal pin extends through whichever cutout is right above. When you turn the key the pin retracts, but sometimes the wheel locks in a place where it puts sideways tension on the pin and makes it hard to turn. If you turn the wheel a bit it releases the tension.
Click to expand...

Visual

 
Originally posted by: Ramma2
Originally posted by: Heisenberg
Originally posted by: forcesho
why doess this happen anyway ? i had it a few times but dont know what cause it
Click to expand...
There's a metal disk on the steering shaft with a bunch of semi-circular cutouts in it. When the wheel locks, a metal pin extends through whichever cutout is right above. When you turn the key the pin retracts, but sometimes the wheel locks in a place where it puts sideways tension on the pin and makes it hard to turn. If you turn the wheel a bit it releases the tension.
Click to expand...

Visual
Click to expand...

thanks for the pic, all of this makes alot of sense now. I always wondered how it knew to lock
 
Steering wheel lock keeps thiefs from hot wiring your car. If thiefs want to steal your car they'll have to knock your ignition cylinder which only takes 5 seconds on a Civic.
 
jesus christ. this is a feature of nearly every car made in the last gazillion years. i can't believe how often this question gets asked here, or that a middle-aged person could have gone their whole life without running into it at least once before.

now for anyone who still doesn't get it:

if you turn the wheel while the key isn't in, it will lock in place. when it is locked, you can't turn the ignition key. to unlock both, just turn the wheel as far it will go (it will still move a little bit) while turning the key.

i have known this since i was a small child, from doing this thing called being observant.

why does this exist? so that when you park on an incline, you can turn the wheel in the correct direction (though something tells me if you don't understand how a steering wheel works, you won't know which is the correct direction), turn the car off, and lock it in place so that your car doesn't roll away. not rolling away = good.
 
Ummm, yea the very first time this happened to me I was able to figure it out myself. The solution seems compltely logical to me.
 
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