New to the C5 world - love the car. I have noticed that occasionally a couple of the lights behind the DIC control panel buttons will go out. Is this a DIY fix? I've read a buch of stuff here on the Forum about replacing all the dash lights with LED's but I'm just interested in fixing this one problem.

Thanks for any advice.

Kent

 

IMO it is a DIY job.
To get to any of lights in the dash you will need to pull the dash off. This is a fairly labor intensive if you have never done it. I have a couple of the same lights that are out and just don't want to do the labor to change two bulbs.
IMO if I'm going to do the labor to get to the bulbs I'm going to change all of them to LED's. The LED's look very good. again IMO.
The site below has a good tech tip on changing to LED's, but more important to you it shows how to pull the dash to get to the lights.
http://www.spdkilz.com/home.html
click on the "tech tip" button. and look for the "DIC LED INSTALL"

Also if you change your mind about changing to LED's it also shows how to do that.
There is a site that sells the lights for this mod that just snap in and do not require any soldering. The same light fixture are used in the door panel.
I have replaced both door panel lights with these LED's and IMO they look very good and can be purchased in different colors.

To find the prewired LED bulbs for the C5 do a google search for
"NEO WEDGE BULB" or "CORVETTE BULB" and the site should be in the first 2-4 sites listed. This site will also have a link to the spdkilz site for the tech info.

I consider this to be a DIY job. It would IMO be prohibtively expensive to have a professional do it. Unless you are just really uncomfortable disasymebling the dash. If you do DIY it wouldn't hurt to have a buddy to help again IMO.

Hope this helps

 

From what I had read, I was afraid the whole dash had to be removed. Like you, I think I'll live with it for now. Makes you appreciate the simplicity of the C1-C2's but still it's hard to beat a C5 that gets 27MPG for road trips!

 

Yea, Your right! I had a 1962 back in my much younger days and I could do all the work on it without any problem. I also had a 1968 a few years later and that one could still be worked on fairly easy. The fiber optic setup was the only thing I never got to work right.
Now the computer world has taken over and I have to keep repeating "computers make my life easier". If I don't then I really get frustrated.
take care

 

The dash does NOT have to come out. See here:
http://www.spdkilz.com/techtip.html#DIC
I just did the LED conversion today. Super easy.

 

https://web.archive.org/web/20120128...m/techtip.html

 

Devs - can we please kill the automatic deployment of the "Related Link" function which pops these necro threads up? It should be an option to select as opposed to auto-on. I swear on the Bible that I have never, NOT ONCE.... ever ..... had a pertinent link or thread come up prompted by that function.

 

I bumped the thread adding the web archive link since the links and info in the thread were all but dead and useless without it.

 

I went back and saw that. It is good info and actually pertinent to an issue I have currently, having paid someone else to do the soldering to swap out to red LEDs.... but who neglected to tell me that the blue hash for the cold dials would still be blue.... so now I do intend to take mine apart to either disable the dial light altogether and kill the blue or find a way to do the work myself. I know I can do it, I'm just not the best at soldering and didn't want to risk cooking the board.

Your info would be great posted as a standalone thread also.

 

I clicked on the link in post #2 and it told me my iPhone was infected.

Might want to delete that crap.

Ron

 

Agreed, the spdkilz domain is now serving malware. Would be good for mods to use the archive.org link and put that in the posts instead.

 

I am guessing your job put a blue led in that one position.. you could replace that one with a red or as you say remove it or black it out. You will not get any light transmission if you put a red filter over a blue led.

Here is photos of what I did. I used warm white led, and behind the blue tinted lens they match the gauges perfectly. These are rated 3000k, a lot cooler than the mini bulbs. I want to do the rest of my lights to match someday..dic and door buttons, maybe even radio (not sure if I want aftermarket radio yet, I just don't use it enough to care) Also the gamma curve of led is different than incandescent. So my setup reasonably matches the brightness at 12v but is too bright at a normal dimming position. I have some ND film to stick on the leds, I just need to open mine up again. I want to do the dic buttons and polish my instrument panel cover at the same time, so it keeps sitting.

RE, soldering, it's not hard but I wouldn't take this on as a beginner especially if you don't have experience desoldering with a sucker. The boards are not easy to replace. Also use a good iron for electronics and not one of those plumbing guns that puts ac on the tip :o

 

If I had a safe 12v power source here to use to fire up the lights in the house I would. For now it will have to wait until I get further along on the Z06 work. I won't be in the garage tonight or tomorrow night with temps hitting -5 in the dark hours.