84 dash cluster
Thread Starter
Instructor
Joined: Apr 2007
Posts: 215
Likes: 1
84 dash cluster
Yesterday I was running the car for a while and my dash was all jumbled just kinda flickering through all the led in no legible pattern. I tapped the top of the dash and it streightened up just fine and I ran the car for an hour or so. I shut the car off and unhooked my negative battery cable (I have a battery drain) and called it a night. About a half hour later I hooked the battery back up and started the car. At first all was good. About 2 or 3 minutes the dash went into a jumble and froze in a normal lit non legible mess a few more taps and no change. About 2 or 3 seconds I saw a small stream of white smoke rising behind the left side if the dash cluster (dashboars is removed). Anyone have input? Dash cluster was rebuilt about a year ago. New battery and alternator too. Could hooking the battery up and starting the car right away fried somthing inside? Could my ECM fried the cluster? HELP!!!
Le Mans Master
Joined: Oct 2003
Posts: 6,130
Likes: 2
From: seattle WA
Well, I'm just going to relay some of my experiences. The first part of your post sounds like a bad ground...so I'd check those first. Mines an 87 so it maybe different, but there's a ground wire on the drivers side post, you have to peel the carpet back to see it, then there's a ground on the drivers side head, close to the firewall, I'm assuming (bad word) the cluster ground itself is OK, since its been rebuilt. And here's a wierd one..after a tune up my dash did all kinds of wierd things (and I had recently replaced the alternator). Gordon Killebrew (the guru) thought my alternator providing to low a voltage took out the cluster. That was not the case! What happened is when I replaced the ignition coil I had accidentally crimped the wire in the cap causing it to short.
ALWAYS look at what you have done recently when a new problem arises. Saved my bacon! I doubt the ECM fried your cluster. Yours sounds like bad connections. And you should check the connection to the cluster as well.
ALWAYS look at what you have done recently when a new problem arises. Saved my bacon! I doubt the ECM fried your cluster. Yours sounds like bad connections. And you should check the connection to the cluster as well.
