Replacement clockspring: 2005 VVT Gen 3

Hi all,

I recently had an airbag warning light come on when turning the wheel at certain points . It has now gone permanent and the horn has stopped working also (where before it worked when the airbag light wasn't on). Seems to pretty clearly be a bad clockspring.

Does anyone know where / how I could get a new one? Any tips for installation?

I have taken some pictures of my current (broken) one which should hopefully help as I understand there are various models.

Send Martin in the bigjimny shop in the top banner a message, he will be able to quote.

I have looked into the specific clockspring for GandHisjimny and like most of Suzuki parts, the one he wants only comes as a complete steering controls set at the predictably high Suzuki cost.

Whilst if anyone who want the whole unit is welcome to come to me for a quote, clearly most of you will want to look for a used one.

When looking for a used one be aware that there are different versions. Some have different connectors (and different numbers of connectors) and some have the same connectors but the positioning of the connections is different on the casing, so choose very carefully to get the correct fit.

It is probably worth remembering that, in terms of parts and electronics, some JImnys can be considered to be a 4WD Suzuki Swift. Therefore for some models you can look at Swtift steering parts if you are going to the used market.

I've accepted defeat on this for now and booked in for diagnostics with my local Suzuki garage. We'll see what sort of princely sum they are looking for to fix.

Thanks a lot Martin for looking into it for me, annoying that it's not an easy part to acquire.

Ok wow, so this has been a big learning experience for me (this is my first car!). I went to the local Suzuki dealer asking for diagnostics and they told me that it wasn't the clock spring, it was the airbag unit itself! They then quoted £1200 (£900 for replacement airbag module, £300 labour etc). I was pretty stunned, especially because I was convinced it was the clock spring, but they're the experts...

Report said "Investigated airbag light on, confirmed fault. Carried out diagnostic scan and found code; B1021 - drivers airbag inflator circuit resistance high. Carried trouble shooting as per Suzuki recommendation and found internal failure of drivers airbag".

At any rate, not a chance I'd be paying £1200 for that so went straight on fleabay. Got a used airbag for £35 and since I didn't fully trust the diagnosis I checked for a clock spring too. Very fortunately I happened to find one and just nabbed it for £45 because they can be awkward to get. I couldn't find one online for about a week (this is before I went to the dealership and got told to replace the airbag instead) but eventually a breaker put up a listing with 4 of them in stock.

To cut my blabbing short, I swapped in the airbag and it did nada! Zilch. Frustrated I then got the replacement clock spring in (with my old airbag) and would you believe it, the light went out immediately and the horn started working.

So anyway, really not impressed by the dealership. I paid £95 for them to misdiagnose the problem and direct me away from my initial hunch which was correct. I am also fairly sure that if they had genuinely performed the steps described in the service manual they would've been able to tell me the fault properly. They had really good front of house / customer service and whatnot but what's the point if they send you up the wrong tree? They even tried to put me onto selling my car, presumably because they wanted me to buy one of their new ones. And like I say, I have literally never owned a car before, I shouldn't be diagnosing a problem like this better than they do. At least they hoovered it and it's all fixed now...

An aside for any future readers, Martin very helpfully got me a quote for a new switch assembly (Suzuki only sell the clock spring as part of a wider unit) and that would've been around £500. A big bill for what is just a spinning bit of wire but it remains an option in the worst case where you cannot find a used one like I did.

Well done on sorting out your problem and reporting the outcome. 
Sometimes dealers forget we are not all "mechanically lacking", those that assume this don't listen to our request or the clues we give them.
I have a similar story. I just wanted confirmation of my diagnosis of a £250 quid valve, their "Engineer" wanted to change the timing chain for £1800. Gave up with them, ebayed a £25 used valve and fixed the problem. Nissan dealer (Arn*ld Cl#rk) just to move to another marquee. I was using the nissan service manual to diagnose valve, what on earth did they use?