Instrument panel is bright, but unreadable. Why?
Thread Starter
2nd Gear
Joined: Mar 2005
Posts: 2
Likes: 0
Instrument panel is bright, but unreadable. Why?
I need the Corvette Forum readers help....... I'm having problems reading the dash on my '86. The instrument cluster is lit and bright, but unreadable day or night. I cannot read any numbers on the Tach, Speedometer or fuel guage lines. I can barely make out how many miles left till empty and can still barely make out the oil pressure and temp/battery. This condition has slowly deteriorated over the past 6 months to the present condition. It appears as if the instrument backlight is too bright and washing out the numbers on the instruments.
Has anyone encountered this problem? If so, what might be the remedy, short of giving someone my life's savings to fix it? It just doesn't appear to be a light bulb problem, since it's already bright.
At this point, I'm open to any ideas.
Thanks!
Mike
Has anyone encountered this problem? If so, what might be the remedy, short of giving someone my life's savings to fix it? It just doesn't appear to be a light bulb problem, since it's already bright.
At this point, I'm open to any ideas.
Thanks!
Mike
Team Owner
Joined: Mar 2001
Posts: 54,124
Likes: 30
From: Cincinnati, Oh USA
At night and in a dark place with a very dark cockpit, does your dash dim down? Can you reduce the dash brightness by turning your headlight switch control all the way counterclockwise? If your backlights stay at full brilliancy, then you have a problem with the circuit on one of the two circuit boards in the cluster. There is an IC (integrated circuit) and a power transistor that controls brightness and one or both could be the reason you have full brilliancy all the time. Most cluster repair centers charge about $250 to repair your cluster.
Thread Starter
2nd Gear
Joined: Mar 2005
Posts: 2
Likes: 0
The light switch dimmer control turned maximum counter-clockwise has no effect on the brightness of the instrument lighting. Sounds like I'm going to be digging deep into my pockets for this one. Thanks for the assistance. Mike
Advanced
Joined: Jun 2003
Posts: 58
Likes: 0
From: miramar florida
instrument cluster
the problem that you have is that the lenses are shot, it's very common on this digital dash, the sun eats them out, you could get a rebuilt one for around 500 bucks, try "corvette dash cluster service.com" their phone was 1-888-454-1911 ?
give them a try and let me know I'm gonna need one too, good luck
give them a try and let me know I'm gonna need one too, good luck
