MazdaManiac

iTrader: (3)

Yes. That appears to have fixed it.
I put almost 100 miles on it today and not only did it not fail, the bias has returned to equal in both directions (when It was in a failing mode, it would turn more easily to the left than right).

Before I took the harness apart, the G/Y wire had slightly more resistance than the other two and was intermittent when the harness was shaken.

hagar852

Thanks for the pics on this thread...

I took out the air box today and cleaned the harness with electronic cleaner.. put it back together and I was driving around with it today...

It failed on me the other day..

One question I can't find the other end of the harness. In the picture it doens't seem to be very long. I tried following the wires but can't find the other end of the plugs.

M-ster

pardon me,

Do i need to disconnect any of the battery terminal (positive or negative) before i disconnect the harness? especially i'm spraying electronic cleaner into these harnesses.

Ta

Nubo

It goes straight down for a ways, riding in a channel. When it gets to the steering rack, the connector for the power (thick) wires is more towards the center and the smaller thinner group of wires branch off to the right and go around a round mount -- under and then counter-clockwise before plugging into the connector.. There are a couple of black zip-ties that hold things down tight against the steering rack. I didn't feel like stripping the loom, padding, etc. So I kept the original wires but did solder them to the crimp connectors.

brillo

my steering has been real light for a while and for the first time in a 40mph turn my steering went into overboost and i did one hell of a power slide that was totally unintentional.

Needless to say I'm going to the dealer tomorrow. I hope they don't give me **** for having to take out my REVi. I'm all for electric advancements, but issues like the above scare the **** out of me.

brillo

Well, that harness fixed that problem, if your steering is acting up or feels light, definately have your harness checked out

M-ster

Hi Brillo, did your dealer just clean the harness? Or did they replace them?

Ta

Jon316G

iTrader: (1)

I've experienced the same problem with my power steering. After reading through these threads I sprayed contact cleaner on the connectors and the problem went away... for about a week. It ended up being about every 5 days I would disconnect the two connectors under the intake box and spray them with contact cleaner. I got frustrated because I knew that the contacts could not be getting tarnished that quickly (plus I checked the o-ring seal and there were no cracks). I ended up taking a flathead screwdriver and bent the contacts down assuming that they just weren't making good contact. Its now been more than two months now and I haven't had any more power steering problems.
Just an FYI... might want to look at the contacts before you go as far as replacing the harness (not to mention the dealer might keep you car for awhile).

MazdaManiac

iTrader: (3)

Yeah, it is a degradation of the contacts that causes the failure, but it also degrades at the crimps.
Squishing it will probably straighten it up. Soldering the wires might even be better.
I just went ahead and replaced the wires since I already had it out for investigation.

Jon316G

iTrader: (1)

Yeah... I really thought about soldering the wires.
Maybe I'll try that this weekend.

MazdaManiac

iTrader: (3)

Can't hurt.

ssanghai

i recently crashed into a pavment . but after the repairs my steering wheel feels really light. i took it to the dealer and the wheels are aligned but still my steering feels really light. the steering monitor sign also switches off as soon as i switch on the car. but i really think theres is problem with that steering now. it basically powerslides. please help me out with this as soon as possible.
thanx

ssanghai

hey where did you get the red rims from. can i get them on ebay or something?

eddybear

Replaced the wires, ok so do you just get any particular gauge wires... im curious, need to know what materials to get beforehand.

Jon316G

iTrader: (1)

Wow... blast from the past!
You obviously can't just go with any gauge wire... I just stuck to the same size wire. I believe the smaller gauge (bigger wire) was 8.
Attached is my layout. The extra cable was just in case I needed the room.
Now most people solder the wires (which I was going to do), but my soldering iron's heating element was bad and couldn't heat the wire enough to reflow the solder.
So I had to improvise!
I took a heavy duty 6AWG ring terminal with a long crimp collar, cut off the ring part of it, and used the collar almost like a butt-splice connector (with the wires overlapping).
A small gauge crimp requires a heavy duty crimp tool (and all your body weight) so luckily work "supplied" me with one.
Now, soldering isn't required with this crimp because, anyone who has crimped a 6AWG wire knows, there is no way that connection is coming loose.
Because I'm a cautious guy, I also double heat-shrunk the connection and then followed it with electrical tape (red to match the car).

Now... this might have been overkill.... but if you don't have access to a GOOD soldering iron (not the cheapy 60W Radio Shack brand), then you might want to consider this.

MazdaManiac

iTrader: (3)

You don't change the two 8ga power wires.
Only the three 14ga torque sensor wires.

Jon316G

iTrader: (1)

Yeah.... I didn't know that at the time, so I did both.
Thanks for clarifying.

Jon316G

iTrader: (1)

I was a little vague on my explanation as to why I did both the 8 and 14 gauge wire.
The reason I didn't know which wire at the time was because I questioned if my issue was with the torque sensor or the power wire.
I didn't want to sound like I was stepping on anyone's toes, especially Jeff because he knows a lot more about this car than I do.
I like to do my own diagnostics and troubleshoot the situation, and my theory was leaning more towards the power wires. I actually quoted above in post #59 this:
The contacts I bent with a screwdriver was the power harness, not the torque sensor harness.
I actually never messed with the contacts in the torque sensor harness (besides spraying them with contact cleaner).
My power steering issue never came back after that. Later on I still crimped the wires together fearing that it may come back.
Not saying that Jeff was wrong, but I thought in MY situation, it could have been the power wire.
Getting tired of dealing with the power steering lose and not wanting to go through that again, I ended up just doing both to cover all grounds (of course now I wish I would have tried one or the other because now I'll never know).

Again, this was something I observed with MY situation with MY car.
I'm sure Jeff is correct that most of the power steering problems is with the torque sensor harness... but I do question my situation.
Sorry for not being clear before, didn't want to start a debate!

eddybear

I wonder if this is on the other side for the RHD vehicle ....

I also noticed something when I took the battery terminal off for a while and cleaned it and put them back on the problem went away for like a day and then it came back. Is it possible my new audio system load on the system is drawing ecessively from the batter yand the failure to supply is causing this electrical failure in the steering?

or is that far fetched...

edit: I just took some stuff off and before i did i noticed my +ve terminal has a brown/silver mix discoloration, could this also be affecting power delivery to this unit?

eddybear

edit:

I found the cable, but which part is it that you pull and re-wire? the part that goes straight down to the steering rack or just that top piece from the plug to the front bumper area??

based on MM's pics it looks like the one that goes down to the rack but based on Jon316G's pics it looks like the top piece, i'm confused.

anyone?

Jon316G

iTrader: (1)

Once to remove your intake box (assuming its stock) you'll see two wire harnesses above the radiator. One has three 14ga wires and the other has two 8ga wires. The torque sensor MM is referring to is the 14ga (smaller) wires. Those are what you solder together.
So basically you're removing the wire harness all together and permanently attaching the wires.

eddybear

ohhh, so that connector that is directly under the coolant overflow tube (the ones for the 3 wires and the one for the 2 wires) you basically jus yanked the wires from the connectors and clamped them together?

So the wire now is one continuous thing straight down to the steering rack ?

In other words from the battery tray going down is stock but that loop of cable above you have crimped together for good?

Jon316G

iTrader: (1)

I actually just cut the wires at the harness. No reason to disassemble the harness if I was going to crimp the wires together.

Correct

The loop of cable is extra 8ga wire and yes, they are crimped together for good.
In both pics you can see the three 14ga wires were I got lazy and didn't fully wrap them.
Remember, that wire runs down and is terminated at another harness.
If I ever need to remove that bundle of wire, I can just disconnect the harness at the steering rack!

eddybear

Last but not least, you disconnected the complete harness and did the junction or did you do it right there on the vehicle...

yesterday i was looking and i didnt see how i was gonna get to the connector on the steering rack, i figure i have to remove the battery tray and psu hfrom there...

any suggestions?

Jon316G

iTrader: (1)

I did it at the vehicle...
You can tell from my first pic above that the wires run towards the driver's side and its taped/loomed. So tracing back where that section of wire runs to, finding where it ends, and also having to disconnect the other section from the steering rack would have been more work than I needed to do.
Doing it at the vehicle was no problem... crimping got a little tight, but not too bad.

I've honestly never disconnected the harness from the steering rack (which is a good thing) so I can't give you any pointers on how to get down there.