Dash Instrument Cluster Light = Dead

[aznpoopy]

car = s14; owner = electrical idiot

leaving my friend's house i notice my dash cluster lights are dead. after getting home i check my parking lights. dead.

for some reason i remember reading that the cluster lights are tied into the parking lights. i check my tail lamp 10A fuse. yep... blown. i pull the 10A from my audio circuit and plug it in. parking lights are back on! but the dash is still dead. checked all the other fuses, all good.

stuff i was doing today:

1) fixing a big ol' chunk of rust on the inside of the trunk. still no clue how it got there. sanded it off with power tools.
2) pulled out my entire center console, including the radio. didn't unplug the negative terminal. :doh:

if it was the actual switch, the parking lights wouldn't come on at all, correct? please tell me i don't have to trace wires... :cry:

any ideas guys?

edit: other info

-last week car was dead, jumped it with a battery box.
-the dash illumination adjuster thing never worked for me. could that be a problem? maybe i should bypass it?

[m0rex]

Hey i had those same exact problems. Check all your fuses i dont know the exact one but its one of those... under the hood, under the dash. For the rust get some... i dont know whats the best for rust but i put some liquid on it and made it really easy to sand off.

[aznpoopy]

problem solved. spent the night with my nose in the FSM.

bypassed the dimmer control (which never worked for me, btw) and it lit up again. some buttons on the heater/AC control lit up too. i never knew they were even supposed to. strange, but true.

[SKHEMR]

I had the same problem on my S14 kouki. I was driving last night and I hit a bump in the road and my dash/parking lights went off. After disconnecting all the things I had hooked up (gauges, boost controller, glow gauges, and turbo timer) it still did not come on. Then I pulled the radio out and it was the illumination wire, I cut it and taped it off and now it works fine. I went through 6 10amp fuse and I have one left.

[Signum Temporis]

problem solved. spent the night with my nose in the FSM.

bypassed the dimmer control (which never worked for me, btw) and it lit up again. some buttons on the heater/AC control lit up too. i never knew they were even supposed to. strange, but true.

haha nice work :)