I just bent a 3/8 drive craftsman 10mm hex drive socket and the bolt will not budge. It is right hand thread correct... If not could someone please let me know. The FSM just says counter sunk bolt. 60 ft/lbs is the torque rating so It seems like it should not be this tight.
Thanks

It's a large diameter bolt, it uses blue thread lock and it has a large surface contact area so it is often very difficult to break free. Use a counter hold like a piece of 1" x 2" on the flat between the spokes of the steering wheel and most important and effective use a small butane pencil torch to heat the bolt which will soften the thread lock and ever so slightly alter the contact surface between the bolt head underside and the tapered recess in the steering hub. It doesn't need much heat as the blue thread lock softens at about 150 F just a bit over the "too hot to keep you finger on it" threshold.

The steering lock should be sufficient to hold the wheel while you loosen the screw. A heat gun might also work to warm the screw and soften the locking compound. An air wrench or impact driver might also help loosen the screw.

Jeremy

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"Buster" in the '95

Our all-Diesel family
1996 E300D (W210) . .338,000 miles Wife's car
2005 E320 CDI . . 113,000 miles My car
Santa Rosa population 176,762 (2022)
Total. . . . . . . . . . . . 627,762
"Oh lord won't you buy me a Mercedes Benz."
-- Janis Joplin, October 1, 1970

Do NOT use the steering lock to counter hold. You will destroy it. As previously mentioned if the bolt has a very large surface area and locktite blue from the factory. You will need a separate counter hold and make sure the key is in the ignition in position 1 so that the steering lock is NOT engaged. It will take a lot of force to remove. Try soaking the perimeter of the bolt in liquid wrench over night. It is a regular thread. Righty tighty, lefty loosy. Make sure you use a high quality 10mm alen tool with 1/2" drive. That excludes anything from harbor freight or China.

This bad boy took 3 days soaking in liquid wrench, heat, dry ice, cut off wheel, 2 impact wrenches, a large mallet and about 100 tries before it finally gave out with a 4 foot breaker bar and 4 foot counter hold. 25 year old German loctite is a *****.
http://i.imgur.com/TLjFs.jpg

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Ahh that bolt! Yes engage the steering lock [edit: better to have someone hold it than use the lock..i have in the past without issue but tjts1 is correct it could harm the vehicle], and get a butt load of extensions!

tjts1, that was one stubborn ass bolt. I've removed 5-6 wheels and havent encountered that much resistance so far.

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82 300SD 145k
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I also removed several steering wheels on the 92 and 93 W201s, 94 W202, 3 different Volvos and 1 BMW which use the exact same mounting system and never had a problem. The 87 300D was a huge pain the ass by comparison. It finally let loose with a very loud POP. There is something about really old locktite that makes it rock hard. I've seen larger bolts slathered in locktite RED that didn't take as much force. Swapping in the 94 W202 steering wheel was totally worth effort.

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USE AN IMPACT, the only way. Otherwise, you will either mess the lock up, or the separate the cushion from the metal ring inside the steering wheel (if you try to hold the wheel)

Reason an impact works, a bunch of quick jerks and you really don't even have to hold the steering wheel.

Do not try this with a harbor freight Impact, cause it's probably not strong enough. I used to use a 3/4 inch 30 lb beast of an impact to loosen, but now I got this great Chicago Pnuematic 1/2 inch impact that loosens nuts that the 3/4 wouldn't. Highly recommend the CP impact.

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I've been thinking about getting a pneumatic impact. Do you have a link to it?

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Cruise Control not working? Send me PM or email (jamesdean59@gmail.com). I might be able to help out.
Check here for compatibility, diagnostics, and availability!

(4/11/2020: Hi Everyone! I am still taking orders and replying to emails/PMs/etc, I appreciate your patience in these crazy times. Stay safe and healthy!)


82 300SD 145k
89 420SEL 210k
89 560SEL 118k
90 300SE 262k RIP 5/25/2010
90 560SEL 154k
91 300D 2.5 Turbo. 241k
93 190E 3.0 235k
93 300E 195k

It's difficult to get an air impact tool into a junk yard, although I believe there are battery-powered electric tools that might work. In my experience of half a dozen steering wheels pulled, a long breaker bar and the steering lock have never failed or done damage. I suppose every situation is a little different. Thanks for the tip on damaging the steering lock, though, tjts1, in the future at home I'll try my air impact gun. At the junkyard I'm not as concerned about "collateral damage."

Jeremy

__________________

"Buster" in the '95

Our all-Diesel family
1996 E300D (W210) . .338,000 miles Wife's car
2005 E320 CDI . . 113,000 miles My car
Santa Rosa population 176,762 (2022)
Total. . . . . . . . . . . . 627,762
"Oh lord won't you buy me a Mercedes Benz."
-- Janis Joplin, October 1, 1970

I am off to procure a 1/2 drive hex socket and a pencil torch. I soaked it in knocker-loose and tomorrow I'll give it another go. Thanks for all the advice. Speaking of advice...is it really necessary to pull the wheel to change out the ignition switch or can I do it with a stubby screw driver through the instrument panel opening? I had to ask although I suspect the answer involves my 2ft breaker bar and a cheater.
Thanks

I gave my impact gun a work out on it as well as my neighbor's much higher quality gun... no dice. The allen tool simply bounced around inside the screw head. To give you an idea of the force involved, this same gun had no problem with the 30mm 12 point nut on the differential pinion. Everybody said if the impact gun won't do it, neither will a breaker bar but thats what did it in the end. I weigh 215LB and I basically had almost all my weight on the 4' cheater bar to break the bolt. This was a unique situation and I've never had this kind of problem with any other steering wheel I've pulled including the JY with hand tools. The OP said he bent the 3/8" tool at which point I would begin to be concerned about the steering lock hence my advice to make sure its disengaged. In a normal situation I think you're right, its unlikely to be damaged.

cheers

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I recently had to pull the steering wheel off my 300SD and had the same
problems.

I can echo the thought that the Harbor Freight impact wrench won't do the
job. Even with full 90PSI it wouldn't budge the bolt.

What finally worked for me was a 3' long piece of rebar between the spokes
of the steering wheel to pull against with my 1/2" breaker bar on the bolt.
It turned amazingly easy with this combo. It even worked on a donor car
in the junk yard to get the turn signal switch I needed to replace.

My bolt had the threads covered in blue lock tight also.

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Will W - 1984 300SD federal

With the torch you'll have it off easily! But if you are referring to the ignition switch/lock combo unit off to the side in the dash you would not need to remove the steering wheel to remove that. That is removed by turning the key to position 1, then unbolting the securing collar that clamps it to the steering column a 5 mm Allen bolt is used in that collar if I remember correctly. Then you can push in the pin on the lock unit which will allow the unit to be withdrawn from its position in the steering column. Then with that out, loose and manuverable you can disconnect the electrical connector at the rear of the lock unit. Sometimes you can get the electrical connector off early in that sequence and sometimes it's just a pain to get it separated, so it ends up being more doable once the lock unit is able to be moved around a bit to allow a better grip and angle.

The electrical connector is "keyed" to the lock unit and the key must be turned to the proper position to allow the plastic "T" shaped key to disengage without breaking it off. Sometimes the pin that needs to be depresed is stiff and difficult to push inward, usually if you wiggle the entire lock unit at that point you can get it the tiny bit better lined up and it will more easily click inward, the lock unit itself will wiggle around a bit once the securing collar and its bolt are lossened.

Well wish I had read this before spending 25 dollars on a snap on socket. Still fun to walk around in the truck tho, I limit myself to 100$ in my pockets when i do.
So I will give it a try with just pulling the cluster then. My fsm says the wheel must be removed so that was what I was following. The socket will come in handy if I ever do have to actually pull the wheel. Thanks to all for the advice.