Tonight while driving home in my 90 Tracker, I started noticing a strong smell of melting/burning plastic. I pulled into a convenience store, broke out my flashlight and started looking around for the problem. I couldn't find anything wrong at first, then noticed the smell was concentrated right at the steering wheel. It seemed to be going away though and I couldn't see anything out of the ordinary, so I continued home. As I hit the road again, I discovered that I didn't have high-beam headlights. When I tried to go to high beams, the headlights would go out! The flash-to-pass part has not been working for some time, but now I had nothing but lowbeam and off.

Once I got home, I started dis-assembling the steering column and still don't see anything melted. I'm guessing that the combination switch assembly(turn signals, headlights, hazzards, wipers) is going bad, but visual inspection shows nothing wrong. Has anyone else had this happen to them? If so, what was the problem? I'm hoping that a local junkyard will have the switch assembly because I can just imagine what the dealer would want for such a part... Guess I have to go invest in a steering wheel puller tomorrow morning...

check up to the left of the column by the fudse box. a black relay box. controls day running lights . they get hot and melt.  trust me. have you changed the bulbs in the headlights

only thing i can think of it a plasic bag on the cat or exahust.

stu

THe same thing happened to me last summer my wife was driving the real red wagon at the time and she said it smelled like burning plastic and the directional was working sometimes when I took it for a ride to see what was up the directional striaght up stoped i pulled the sterring wheel, pulled apart the collum regreased everything and havent had a problem since be careful when you pull apart the collum cause theres alot of little pieces in there i think it had just gotten dirty and was causing the parts inside to arc out  :-/

oh  and you shouldnt need a puller to get the wheel off theres one nut and it just came off mines a 95 tracker so im pretty sure its the same 96 is when they changed

Well, I took the column apart and got the wheel off(without a puller, Thanks!:)) and removed the combination switch assembly. Then I took that apart and discovered a burned area on the pc board right around the high beam contacts that was so far gone, it had melted the solder away from the area and burned through a nearby wire! I guess I was lucky I didn't have a fire!

I went to a salvage yard and got a new/used combination switch assembly(as well as a new spare tire cover and rear seat prop rod) and replaced it this afternoon. Next up I think I will relay the headlights to lessen the current flow through that pc board so this wont happen again!

The same thing happened to my 89' Kick
about 7 years ago, took it all apart, didn't
find any problem, just a small burned spot,
cleaned and regreased, put it back together,
it's been fine since.

Wild

I was planning/hoping I could do that, too, but it was a little too far gone for that... Oh well... I think I will definately add in some relays to reduce the amperage through there. That would HAVE to help.

Yes they would, make sure they are rated 15-20
Amps, or the relays could get hot too

Wild

I'll be using 30 amp Bosch relays, one for highbeams, one for low beams. Anyone know where I might be able to find some 9004 socket pigtails so I don't have to hack my harness? LOL!

You should be able to find some 3 wire
male/female plug/sockets to add into
the system, this would give you the
option to go back should you want to.

Be warned, Japaneese wireing and circuits
are very backwards to our thinking, the switch
grounds the system, at least on mine, I tried to
add some way to get the high and low beams
on at the same time, all the wires I tested were
hot !!!  so I don't know how much work it would
be to find the right way to hook it all up.

Good Luck

Wild

PS. I gave up trying to get them on at the same time.

well, once I get into doing it, I will be sure to post what I find. Thanks for the head's up:D