Hey everyone, just looking for advice.

2004 Crossfire. 118k miles

My key will no longer turn in the ignition cylinder. Took it to the dealer. They told me it was a pin in the ignition cylinder. Fine by me.

Now they’ve called me and told me they cannot remove the cylinder without breaking the housing and have doubled the repair price.

For now, I’ve told them to hold off.

Any help would be much appreciated!

-Pat

 

Check out the TSB's and How To Articles section of the forum. There is a Sticky for the Ignition Key Fix.

You do not need to break the assembly the stuck pin can be drilled out, however, that is additional labor time the dealership would charge you, and they may not be willing to do that as it disables the steering wheel lock in place function. I did it on my 04 Crossfire and I do not miss it.

You can also use the search function to find many more related threads.

 

It's most likely NOT a pin in the cylinder itself. As Toolman stated it is probably the other pin that engages the wheel lock that is causing the problem. Dealers will swear it's the cylinder but it usually isn't. You can always try spraying some carb cleaner in to the key hole followed by a heavy dose of WD 40 and running the key in and out about a dozen times and see if you may be able to get a stuck wafer in there moving again but I doubt that is your problem. You're not going to hurt anything doing that because you're going to have to take the whole thing out and apart anyway if it isn't a wafer in the cylinder sticking. You can do the sticky key fix t yourself but you'll need to drill that pin out as shown in the video to get the ignition to slide to the right for removal. YouTube has a great video uploaded that shows the process although his fix did not require the pin to be drilled out. It has been viewed about 40,000 times so that should tell you something considering there were only about 70,000 Crossfires ever made.

 

I did the mods and the steering wheel still locks.

 

Same here, no difference before and after.

 

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The sticky key fix is pretty easy as referenced by almost everyone that has done it successfully (even members who never did this type or any other type of technical work like this). It involves a step-by-step easily outlined sequence of tasks simply put in the help file located here in the document collection for free (downloadable). Like suggested, read/compare the text with the pictures at least twice, and re-follow the tutorial as you do it, from what most say it is easy-peezy. As many have stated, the time spent gave them a lot of confidence with the help provided here in the forum (and it is almost entirely free to DIY, just a few simple tools, easily available, which BTW is outlined in the tutorial). The 'stealerships will needle your wallet until your super frustrated, and they may not get it fixed at all! Download the tutorial, read it a few times, if you still think your unable to do it find an independent European car shop that has worked on a Benz SLK320from @ 2004 and ask them to do the repair (make sure you give them the tutorial). I have heard one who has done it before can accomplish it in about an hour or so. Good luck!


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