Date: Fri, 4 Jan 2002 02:09:38 -0000 From: "Lineone" <adriannopsamone.org> Subject: Re: Dash in Total Darkness???
Brad, I love the notion of a "dimming" radio. It's good to have a sense of humour about previous owners sometimes. Adrian "brad" <bradnopsamam.brad3.demon.co.uk> wrote in message news:qt9rzCAxAON8EwGwnopsam3.demon.co.uk... > In article <3C2F515D.66F655B1nopsamathome16.freeserve.co.uk>, MBeest > <MBeestnopsamathome16.freeserve.co.uk> writes > >unscrewing and screwing in the bulbs does work - but only up to a point. > >After a while it wears out the flexible PCB that carries the electric power to > >the bulbs (you can see this when you remove the grille in the dashboard - > >it's flexible blue plastic with copper strips in it). > >Once that happens, the PCB needs replacing. That's an expensive part > >and since the dashboard must be dismantled and reassembled it's costly in > >labour too (I know - it happened to me and hurt my wallet!). > > > >One thing I found though was that the heat of the bulbs had warped (but not > >quite melted) the plastic and so the electric contacts weren't very good. If you > > > >can make do without the lights on absolute full brightness it might help here. > > > >MB. > <SNIP> > > I have suffered from this for ages on my 89 900i16. I think I have just > fixed it over the Christmas holiday... > > I also have a plastic panel warped by the heat of the bulbs and a worn > pcb meaning I lost all illumination. After years (literally) of > slapping the dash and twiddling the lamp holders through the speaker > grille I sorted a permanent fix after it became impossible to keep the > lights on for more than a couple of bumps in the road: > > I removed both bulbs and holders and soldered wires to the exposed metal > contact on either side of the holders (with a narrow tipped soldering > iron) to allow me to wire them in parallel to a supply I located in the > dash which is +12V with the ignition. On mine it's actually on the > lighting circuit but supplies the radio - which therefore goes off when > the rheostat is turned down! - a legacy of a previous owner's tinkering. > > You should be able to locate a suitable supply off your radio (the +12V > ignition line) which will make the dash lights shine whenever the car is > running. That is how my always was - if you have a later model where > the dash lights come on with the headlights, you may be able to test > with a meter to find a supply which will still do that. > > The exposed solder connections were taped over to prevent any shorts, > and the floppy pcb sections serving the bulbs gently moved out of the > way. These were then wrapped in insulating tape to make sure that they > cannot short against the new wiring. I fitted an in line fuse holder > with a 750mA fuse in the new wiring to the bulbs, just in case (3W bulbs > should pull 250mA on 12V). > > What I have done is entirely reversible (should anything turn out to be > wrong with it). The lights won't dim (but I never wanted them to anyway > - even if it wouldn't have shut the radio off), but I can now see the > speedo in the dark again! If the problem is with the contact on the > bulb holders, I think it's a good fix - just take care to avoid shorting > anything out. > > Sorry to go on a bit - I hope this helps. :-) > > > -- > brad
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
