Tonight was driving down the highway, pulled over waiting for a friend to catch up, pulled back onto the road and my dash was out, like signal lights, brights indicator, CEL, all that worked, gauges worked fine, the illumination part didnt. (CEL is code 12 i think, 50 key on cycle thing) not relevant to my problem though.

My park lamps wont work either, only when the brake is pressed or signal turned on will they work.

Id like to think my headlight switch is at fault. What do you guys think is going on here?

I check my fuses in the car, they seemed all up to par. I didnt do any underhood ones, but I shall in the morning.

Need some help here.thanks.

sean

 

There is an interior light fuse in the box under the hood as well. Should affect the radio illumination too...

Best of luck!

 

The interior fuse is good. As for radio illumination, I have an aftermarket stereo in my car. Also, I have installed a tachometer and for the tach illum. I ran a wire to the headlight switch and that worked fine. The tach illum. also went last night too. Might narrow something down, IM not to sure.

thanks sean

 

Well I got pissed off and decided to tear into a bit deeper. I got a schematic so I traced down all wires associated with the dash lights and tail lights and grounds are all good, even the one from the gauges itself, yes i tested it.

In conclusion, theres a black/yellow wire, well theres 2 of the same colour wire that branches off right from the headlight switch. One of them goes to the taillights and one to the dash illumination. Go figure. and there is no power with in this wire.

My question now, how could this be. I was at rest and all of a sudden this wire stops putting out power. I went and got a different headlight switch today, so I doubt that, that is the problem.

What do you think radar. I need my car at night lol

 

run the power cables all the way to the power source, your answer just might be a loose wire. Age does affect wiring somewhat, mines a 95 though and ive never had that problem, nor heard of it from my bro(original owner). Check it out, might be somthing simple that you can just re attach a wire or two, if not, cant tell you what to do. Thats just my opion, im shure radar has a more educated opinion.

 

I'll see about digging out the FSM from under the passenger seat and tracing back the wiring. It's a '98 manual... my '95 FSM was stolen...

The Black/yellow wires also power the parking lights. But I'll trace it back to the source. In the mean time, take a multimeter and check for power right were the fuse is under the hood. I know that it goes from the battery, to the PDC, to the fuse, then to the headlight switch. Don't remember what connectors were in there...

 

Hey, sorry my computer went down for awhile. When you say check the fuse under the hood, which one are you exactly referring to?

thanks, sean

 

Well you found the problem obviously well enough now just trace the source back. If you have a schematic check for you power input to the switch. If you have power to the switch (Check with a test light too, make sure you can hold a load) then obviously power in no power out the switch burnt out. If it has now power in to this point then go back further to source fuse and check for proper power there as well. Just start were you know you have no power and easiest access points and see what you have. Ie. fuses are great place to check and check you fuse with a meter if ou have one as a hairline crack has been known to cause a headache or 2 in the industry. But check at the easiest points and then narrow down from good places to bad. you will find it.