I'm completely lost on this. Have a feeling you will be too, but it's worth a shot.


Typical GM steering is always tight and responsive. (on the newer trucks anyways).

A few months back I installed a power supply in my truck and ran an 8ga wire directly from the battery to the supply. I didn't install an inline fuse because the supply has a built in fuse.

So Friday I take off after work to go up north and all is well.

Saturday morning I wake up early to go fishing, and we jump in the truck and it smells terrible. Couldn't place the smell, but it was strong. I looked and looked for anything, but finally just gave up and went on with my day. The smell went back and forth in strength all day long.

Sunday we packed up and headed back down to Payson with the smell faintly noticeable but we ignored it. So we're sitting in the Sonic drive-thru waiting for our food when all of the sudden my "Service Brake System" light comes on, and my dash lights start freaking out, followed by a lot of smoke coming through the vents in my dash. Not wanting my truck to burn down next to a building, I quickly pulled out and over to a parking spot, shut it off, and grabbed some water bottles to figure out where the fire was.

After shutting the truck off the smoke died down, and after looking a bit I could see that the smoke was coming from between my firewall and the carpet/sound proof padding. So I sprayed some water back in there when some of it hit my steering shaft and started boiling which I thought was very odd.

The 8ga wire had come loose from where I had it and moved it's way up against the U-joint connection and so for however long it took, every time I turned my wheel it would rub that wire. Well this weekend was the weekend it decided to get past the insulation and make contact. The steering shaft was hot almost all the way down to the gear box, and the wire was melted and not in good shape. I think what was burning was the padding due to how hot the shaft was getting.

I pulled the wire out, and cleaned everything up, no damage done and thankful it wasn't worse. Jump back in the truck and take off down the road when I notice that my steering wheel now has a good 2 inches of very loose play in it, and when it does get to the point of turning my wheels it seems a lot stiffer than normal. Visually I can't see anything wrong, and I can't come up with any logical explanation how this could be related to the wire and it getting the metal shaft hot, but I also can't believe it's just coincidence.

Any brilliant ideas ? :)

Could it have sent current through the steering box overheating the fluid or messing up a check valve. It sounds crazy but could it have magnetized anything in there?

Good thought.. I'm planning on going over anything again today after work. I'll check that out.. I could understand it being stiffer, but I don't get the whole play in the wheel .

Got it fixed today.

Bought a new steering shaft, pulled the old one out and then realized that inside the rubber seat that bolts to the firewall rests a plastic bushing with two rubber o-rings. The o-rings had melted to the plastic and to the metal shaft, which is where I was getting my stiff steering from. The play in the wheel I think came from it being old and worn out, along with the bushing being partly melted and not holding everything in place. All is well again.

glad it's fixed, thanks for posting the solution