2007 XC70 Stuck Ignition Switch

[pittsjock]

Greetings:

My wife's 2007 XC70 has been running great since rehabing the pcv system a month or so ago. I decided to run to town last night in her car just to see how it was running and was pleased. Got home, parked it and did the rest of the evening.

This morning early, wife jumped in her car to do her day and the ignition would not turn. She came back inside and sure enough, stuck. No amount of fiddling, moving the steering wheel etc. would unstick it. We tried all three keys and plenty of wiggling. She took my truck.

I ran through the archives and found the Step by Step instructions on getting past this problem. I removed the electrical end of the switch and sure enough, the car started right up.

The switch has never stuck on my wife (or me).

Looks like I get to order a new lock cylinder, but I hate to just replace parts without being certain this is the problem.

Is there any way, short of removing the entire cylinder to confirm?

Any chance that the transmission interlock could be stuck at the ignition switch or otherwise be putting sufficient pressure on the cylinder that it can't turn?

I am probably grasping for straws here, but I sure don't need to be without a car for a week while we wait for the replacement parts.

[pittsjock]

Update:

I removed the transmission interlock this afternoon and that did nothing.

I put some graphite in the lock. Nothing.

I shot a little WD 40 in the cylinder, grasping for straws. Stuck.

So I figured I might as well remove the whole unit in the outside chance that I could fix it and knowing that it was likely going to come out in any event.

I took a Dremel with a flexible pencil attachment and diamond cutoff wheel. I had no trouble cutting a slot into the left side screw and it came right out. My cutoff wheel is pretty big (1 inch maybe 1 1/4) so I could only cut a slot in the top half the head of the right screw. I heated the screw with a soldering iron and tried. It would not come out. I ground the slot a bit more and it loosened right up. The whole thing might have taken 15 minutes.

Once disassembled, I took the cast cylinder piece into my shop and started playing with it. The metal plate on the underside looked like the key to getting inside. Basically, it looks like the final step in assembly was dimpling the edge of the pot metal casting to hold the plate in place. I took my Dremel and cut away the deformed metal. After a couple of passes, I was able to pop the plate partially up. I started to try and get it out and decided to try the key. For whatever reason, moving the plate cleared the jam and the key started turning again.

So, I ended up pushing the plate back in and using a punch to dimple it tight again. Key is working fine now.

I reinstalled the lock and cleaned up my mess. The car is working fine.

I am going to order a new cylinder tomorrow because I am guessing this will happen again. We live in a rural area and my wife is a good sport. We will take our chances until the new cylinder comes in.