Long story short. Picked up a 2000 Navigator steering wheel today for my 2003 F-250, cruise only XLT. Managed to get airbag light to clear, cruise control to work, and horn to work Only needed 4 of the 5 wires in the tiny plug to get these things working. I figured I could use the fifth wire for the steering wheel controls, but no such luck. Here's where it gets interesting.

Steering wheel buttons--both the climate control and the audio buttons--can be assigned to my Sony XAV-AX5000 head unit. Wiring directly to the steering wheel and bypassing the clock spring worked wonderfully. When I tried to use the "spare" wire in the clock spring to do the steering wheel buttons, nothing worked. Checking continuity between the plug under the dash and the tiny plug on the clock spring tested good. But what was strange is that the wire I was using (green with orange/red tracer) seemd to have continuity with other wires in the harness too! So it's back to the drawing board for now until I get this figured out.

Am I incorrect to think that all 7 wires in the clock spring (2 airbag, 5 buttons/illumination/ground) should be unique and independent? Or should there be some intended shorts between some of the wires??

I was so excited to have gotten everything figured out to work, but then the plan fell flat when buttoning it up. The 2000 Navigator steering wheel looks damn good in the 1999-2003 super duty, period correct, etc. The wood is also nice.

 

Might try reading through this thread on Steering Wheel

 

well aren't you helpful. I read that thread and got no useful information out of it because no one would just post the wiring diagram. I don't have issue with the wiring only asking about the weird continuity with the existing clock spring. thanks for playing.

I have a navigator clock spring now and made my own adapter for interfacing with the f250 wiring. one wire is pulled out of the plug for running to my aftermarket head unit.

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meh. so be it.

 

You had zero replies and this is an engine forum, just here to help. Enjoy your stay.

 

....... or not!

add another to the list.

 

So true, it would not be hard to help or figure out. Maybe 10 minutes of research and 1 to 2 hours of actual work to fix the problem.