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Umm, letsee. I have a 1995 Plymouth Neon. Last October, my after-market cd player was ripped off (the theif just cut the wires and didn't bother to take the time to disconnect the wiring harness... ). My hubby and friend installed my new (mp3) player and all was well. Of course, I then had to replace the factory speakers to handle the power (nothing major, no amp) and again, all was well. I don't know if any of this plays into my current problem or not, but thought I should mention it.

About a month or so ago, the dashboard illumination quit on me. All other dash lights (like the turn signals, the airbag, engine light, etc. that breifly light up on start-up) work. Along with the illumination going, the door chime when the lights are left on or the key is left in the ignition doesn't work (although it does for the "fasten seatbelt" warning - go figure [sm=lame.gif] ). The headlights work, so I was pretty much ignoring the non-existant illumination (a pain when driving at night), but the other night I noticed that I didn't have any tail lights at night either (yet the brake lights work [sm=smiley26.gif] ). So now this has me worried that I better get something done.

When this first happened, I of course thought (or hoped) it was a fuse and checked both the inside fuse box and the one under the hood. All fuses seemed fine. I'm now thinking that there may be a bulb blown under the dash, or a relay of some sort that has gone. Anyone have any ideas? Or am I going to have to submit to the trial and error (and pay big bucks) for a shop to have a look at it?

Ok, on a totally other subject, anyone have any ideas why my rad bubbles like crazy when I turn my car off? I've had this problem for years and it seemed to go away, but with the warmer weather, it's reared its ugly head again. I had the rad flushed in December.

Thanks in advance for any help you may have!

Cindy

 

Did you check the cap to make sure it holding the right pressure? Your car actually heats up when you stop - hot soak - due to the lack of airflow, the fans not being run, and the water pump not circulating fluid - seems like you are saying its boiling over when you park it and the cap is responsible for keeping the pressure in the cooling system so it will boil at a higher temp...

As for the electrical problems Id check for a common ground for those circuits that may have not be making good contact or is loose...best bet is to do voltage drop tests or check your continuity to ground to see if it is a ground or power side problem - this breaks the circuit in half so at least you know where to start narrowing it down to...

 

Actually her symptom w/ electrical has to do w/ the DIMMER wires ...she prolly has it wired into the 12 volt amp input/memory yellow and red wires, no biggie just disconnect the orange wires from your harness and change the fuse. unless you have a cd player w/ dimmer feat. on it then you could prolly use it, however, most aftermarks have auto dimmers anyways so you dont need it.

 

You were close! Thanks for suggesting to look at the cd wiring, as we've located the problem...now just to fix it! The orange wire from the car was not hooked up to anything. The yellow 12 volt amp wire from the car was hooked up correctly. What seems to be the problem is there is a red wire from the car that is providing constant power as well...weird. It was hooked together with a green/black wire (which seems to run the dash lights, door chime and tail lights) also coming from the car, but was not taped well, so the connection was not complete. So anyway, when this red wire hooks up to the green/black wire, the lights and door chime stay on...even without the key in the ignition! Does it seem strange to anyone else that there are two wires (one yellow, one red) coming from the car that is providing constant 12 volt (both yellow and red turned on the dash lights, etc. when connected to the green/black wire without the key in the ignition)? I would assume that as everything else to do with the cd player is working properly that the other wire from the cd player that hooks into the 12 volt ignition is hooked up correctly. So what the heck is this other red wire, and how/where do I hook up this green/black wire so that the dash illumination, tail lights and door chime hook into the headlight switch??? Ack! We have a friend who is an electrician (and a drunk!) who will be coming over later today to have a look (like I have complete confidence in him...yikes!). I'll let you know what happens, but if anyone has any further ideas on this red wire, I'd be greatly appreciative!

Thanks again.

Cindy

 

Thanks...I'll try replacing the rad cap. I'm pretty sure we tried this before, but it's a cheap part, so I'll give it a go again. I've only overheated once on a really long road trip in the mountains when the temp was close to 40C. I've had this car since May 1994 and it's really been pretty darn reliable (I'm knocking on wood as I type this). I've got 185K kms on the "smartie" and have replaced the brakes once, replaced the clutch once (early on) and had the O2 sensor go once. Not much to complain about, eh?

Thanks again.

Cindy

 

Well if its on the cd player harness side just wire the (Yellow)12 volt mem together, as the red wire usually means the power wire. THIS IS NOT NECESSARY but does work if you dont know what wire is what. Unless you drive a BMW they are pretty easy to Identify. If you got the aftermark model harness then it should say on the wires where everything goes. Hope this helps. Unfortunately I havent put a CD Player in a neon in 2 years so I dont remember all the colors in the dash for audio. Most of them are universal.

 

When my other cd player was ripped off, they cut behind the wiring harness of the car (bastard!). So I was left with bare wires from the car [:@]. So you're saying to wire the yellow 12 volt constant from the car (the wire says 12 volt on it) along with this miscellaneous red one from the car, both into the yellow mem wire on the cd harness? I guess then I need to know where to wire the green/black one (that runs the illumination, door chime and tail lights). There's nothing left from the cd player (except for the auto antenna). LOL! Ah-yeeeeeeee![sm=headbang.gif]

Thanks so much for your help so far. I guess this is really a small problem compared to what CAN happen.

Cindy

 

Bueller?............Bueller?

The drunk didn't make it over on the weekend (not surprised), so I haven't fixed anything. If anyone has any further ideas, I'd love to hear em. I'm thinking of wiring the green/black wire into the 12 volt ignition wire. This should make the tail lights, dash illumination and door chime all work when the ignition is on (I think). Guess I'll get me some electricians tape and give it a go...



Cindy

 

I was searching last night and found this post, now today i find myself with a similar problem. I was wondering if you ever found the problem?
My situation is no dash lights for my gauges and no tail lights. I was hooking a radio up to the neon i just got and some of the wires didn't match up. I did not have the wiring diagram for the radio and long story short i wired the illumination (orange wire from car) to i think the remote amp wire, which made the speakers zap really loud when i turned the car on. I knew this was wrong and fixed the problem by unhooking these two wires. I was driving tonight turned on my lights and pop, then no dash lights and no tail lights. I have checked the fuses they look alright but i will have to check continuity.

 

ok from the radio there should be a red and a yellow both being power and they should go to (red from the radio goes to red w/ whit stripe on car harness) (yellow on the radio goes to pink on the car harness) and orange on the radio goes to orange on the car harness. there is no green/black on the radio circuit or atleast the shouldnt be. I would suggest wiring your green/black or whatever runs all the things you want to with with the key on to fuse 15(wiper circuit) and those things will work with the key on and with the vehicle running, i have all the mitchell wiring diagrams im goin to try to get good pics and post them for you