Back in early June I was involved in an accident that caused around 9 grand damage to my Mazda 3. The car was fixed and was running very well.

Now out of now where the steering wheel has gotten tight and the Steering Assist Malfunction Light has come on and the car will not start. On top of that my OBD reader can not access or communicate with the PCU / computer.

Is it possible that the PCU is bad? Everything else seems to work fine except the steering and the car just will not start. Hopefully someone has some advice so thank you in advance.

 

if the OBD reader can't connect, the pc is fried or maybe just lost power. this post is older so I hope u got it fixed by now.
the steering gets stiff when ign is off, not sure if it's no speed messages or something else, but it should recover when you drop below 13MPH if the engine is running... that is at least how it works on my 2007.