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Drilling 86 190e Tumbler/Ignition

5K views 7 replies 6 participants last post by  isaimichel 
#1 ·
Hi All,

I have been struck with the dreaded frozen tumbler problem. I have tried for days to wiggle that sucker into position 1 with all kinds of methods. I think it will soon come down to the option of hacking into the assembly but i am unsure on a couple of things:

1. If i drill the tumbler out and manage to rotate it into pos 1, will this allow the steering lock to be released? (The wheels aren't turned, they are straight)

2. Do i need to remove the faceplate or will drilling through it sufice?

3. From all the posts i have read i believe the procedure is, drill tumbler, rotate into position, insert removal tool into holes and pop out exisiting tumbler then replace. Is there any more to it than this?

Any help would be much appreciated.
 
#4 ·
So....Was very very close to taking the drill to the ignition but thought i'd leave the drill at work and give it another night of jiggling before i let loose on it. I set off and started jiggling as usual but soon came to the point where i figured that i was going to wreck the ignition anyway so i attached a pair of multigrips to the key vertically and started rotating the key back and forth quickly with a little force. This managed to mangle the insides enough to allow it to turn just past the release of the steering lock. I promptly got out wire and started jaming it in the holes to work the sucker out of position...but to no avail. I had another look around on the net and found out that the proper removal tool is 12 guage wire (2mm), the wire i was using was 1.54mm and seemed very hard to get both in the holes at the same time.

This morning at work i found some high tensile 2mm spring steel and grinded up some 70 degree angles on the ends and made some right turn bends a few inches from the angle so i would have more control over which way the angles went in. i got home and managed to feed one wire further in that i had gotten with the smaller stuff. i couldn't manage to get the second one in and tried the smaller wire i had and noticed that it also wouldn't go in. I tired quite a few times to get at least one 2mm and one 1.54mm in but no luck. I then decided what the hell and got out my old friend the multigrips, i started rotating the key again and managed to get the accessories to come on. I then aligned the holes up and managed to get both 2mm bits of wire in and the damn thing came out!!!!!

We are going to order a new tumbler tomorrow and then all should be good. Thanks 190rev707 for your help, it has been much appreciated.
 
#6 ·
drilling is the only way if the wheel is locked, if its unlocked you may be able to get away with pushin the pin of the wheel lock. please search first.. also i would try to jigle the crap out of the key to get it to turn.
 
#7 ·
Some people suggest using a sander (without paper) or some other electrical device that will vibrate very rapidly held against the key while you attempt to turn it. When this happened to me I have to admit I tried this method without success, but it sounded plausible.
 
#8 ·
Don't know about drilling out, but I have replaced the tumbler before (long time ago). Got a new tumbler for $40 from NAPA :p then bent a wire to pop out the old tumbler.

You can either buy the MB tool to do it or use a piece of wielding flux at exactly the right angle. Search Usenet (or the Google usenet archives) with my user name and 'ignition tumbler', there some guy describes EXACTLY how to bend a piece of wire if you want to do it yourself. I used a coat hanger and it eventually came out ... I don't recommend that.
 
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