Just finished installing a used clock spring and everything is working great. Luckly I found out from this guide https://www.youcanic.com/guide/mitsu...ng-replacement how to find the center of the clock spring before putting it on. Everything is working great. At first I was very confused as I had never done this before.

Your tips and the guide I posted had a video that explained the whole process in detail.

 

The clock spring can 10000% be fixed. It's actually quite simple if you have some patience. Unless the tape it broken. Then you can't fix the actual wiring on the tape unless you're an electrical wizard and can solder all the points and find the correct tape to do it with.

I accidentally separated mine when pulling the steering wheel. Forgot to disconnect and pulled the cover off the housing.

So first
- wind the tape all the way into the housing to take up all the slack. Tape goes over one yellow wheel and under one of the black center taps (the three tabs that hold the top portion onto the attached housing.
- after that, carefully place the separated portion back on without pinching or mangling the electric tape, needs to be well aligned and maybe take a tool to gently get it over the yellow wheels
- line up the 3 tabs into the 3 receptacles and see if you can press it in. Unfortunately the center portion can move independently of the tape portion so this takes a lot of patience. (WAIT to officially lock it in until the turn signal reset is good or do it now if you want to skip that step) I had to take some 90 degree needle nose to get the tabs to lock into eachother since the housing portion that works the turn signal reset would press too far down under the separated portion.
- now follow the directions on the housing, 3 and 3/4 turns to the left and double check it by turning it till it stops in both directions. Now make sure it's centered based off how that goes. Mine went 3 turns one way and 4 turns another so it likely won't be 100% perfect but lock to lock on each side is only like 2 turns anyway so you're good.
- now that you have that in, make sure the turn signal reset works! You can skip this step BUT the turn signal won't reset or will reset in some weird *** position way off the center and mostly be useless for daily driving. Hit the turn signal and then turn the clock spring to reset. It most likely will be way off the top center. You want this centered at the top like an OEM clock spring comes set as. This takes a lot of troubleshooting and patience and is a very difficult step. You can figure out where the signal is resetting on your center portion and then press on that center portion and turn it to get it where you need without unwinding the clock spring. After you get it exactly where you need (top center) now you can lock down the 3 tabs portion and the attached housing with the 90 degree needle nose or maybe a small 90 degree pick tool. It isn't super easy to lock in but it'll make it work like OEM again and not throw the signal reset off down the road.
- After all that you should test everything with the wheel attached like the clock spring reset etc (I jacked the front wheels up so I could turn everything back and forth without issues) then should be good and you repaired the unrepairable.

This is how my center portion wanted to be aligned to have the turn signal reset perfectly centered. Try the dots and open areas where these are for reference. (Sorry the bottom square wasn't perfectly centered yet)