Hi, I have a 99 Honda Civic that somebody vandalized, or was trying to steal. The steering wheel column is sagging on the right side, and when using the lock to try to change the position of the wheel up or down, that wouldn't work. Turning the key also did nothing. I called my insurance company and they took the car and two weeks later are declaring it a total loss, likely just because of the year of the car. This is a huge bummer, it's a great car, with only 84,000 miles on it. I would hate to scrap it for something seemingly so minor a problem, but I'm not sure if it's minor or not. I'm with the world's worst claims adjuster, he likely won't give me any info of their findings of the inspection, probably didn't even inspect it, to be honest. Does anyone have any expertise with this, or can anyone tell me I should let the car go, or is this something I should bring to a shop, potentially how difficult/expensive it would be to fix? I love this car. Any info would be helpful, thanks. Let me know if more information would help. Also, the tow truck driver called me later and said he got the car started by connecting the ignition switch. I had to Uber to where the car was and told him not to take it, but he just took it anyway. So any info would be greatly appreciated.

 

I'm sure the insurance is just trying to say total loss since it's an older car. This should be easily fixable by the looks of it.

Pull the column cover trim pieces off. Inspect for any damaged wiring. Likely the vandal damaged / cut the electrical switch portion of the ignition. You can buy a new ignition switch and install it.

Also, you should inspect the lock cylinder on the steering column. If the vandal put a screwdriver or something into the cylinder, it could be damaged. How does your key behave? Will it insert all the way as smooth as before and still turn the lock cylinder? If so you're probably OK. If not, you may need to replace the cylinder. If you have to replace it, you will need to strip down the column and there are two shear-head bolts you must drill out to remove the old cylinder from the column. I like to drop the column down into the floorboard to get a good angle on these bolts for drilling. When installing the new cylinder (either one from a junk yard or a new one from Honda) you can either buy new shear head bolts from Honda or simply use a socket head bolt with the correct thread pitch to attach the new cylinder. Socket head bolts will be less "theft deterrent" than the shear head bolts, but honestly a thief is going to break the column and not sit there and unbolt the cylinder, so you should be fine to use them.