So I take my car to Electronic Express to get the stereo installed. Takes the guy about 5 hours to do an amp install in dash dvd and rewire all the speakers. He calls me and asks if my speedo and everything were out when I brought it in and I said no. So I coulnd't figure it out, he doesn't know what he touched I said I'd see if I could find anything in the repair manual and bring it back and he said we'd go from there.

But heres what it does

When in the 1st ACC position - Clock comes on, all acc lights come on (airbag, turn signal, engine, etc, the normal ones that should come on) Power Seat and Steering tilt WORK.

2nd "On" position - Clock dies, No speedometer backlight, no needles. Power seat and Steering tilt DO NOT work.

Car Started: Nothing works in the gauge cluster (except airbag, turn signals etc.) The needles don't move at all, there is nothing. The clock is dead, the miles are dead.


We checked the fuses, nothings blown.
Does anybody have any idea what he could have tapped into that stopped it from working completely? This isn't a situation where I need the cluster redone with lights, its something thats not giving power to the cluster. Are there any relays to check or anything!! I hate to make them take it to the a shop to fix it but they'll do that if we can't figure it out. I just can't think how something would have shorted out. It seems like something just got unplugged somewhere and I'm about to dive into it and try to figure it out.

What gets me is why the clock works in the ACC positoin, and seats and tilt does, but not when the car is on.

BTW, the car does remember the steering tilt position when I move the key to ACC position, so whatever remembers that isn't losing power.

The clock loses its time every time I start the car and put it back to the ACC position.

 

I'm starting to think something shorted out in the gauge cluster and it just needs to be replaced as I went back through all the wiring and everything and nothing seems to be wired even close to the gauge cluster, like nothing tapped into any of the lines or anything like that. I'm completely stumped. I wish I had another cluster lying around to try in my car.

 

for what it's worth, the radio houses a small portion of the dimmer circut that controls the rest of it.

 

Well whats weird is that I installed a radio last week and everything worked fine, but I returned it to Circuitcity (same model thats in now), because they didn't want to install an amp for me, so I was like okay I'll go over here to the place that has free installation

There's 3 plugs that go into the back of the cluster. When looking at the front (connectors on back), which one has the connections for power to the lights and needles so I can try to trace that wiring back to the source.

 

Its' possible that the dimmer wire was shorted out and that caused your cluster to get fried. Just a theory, but it seems possible. Check what they have the dimmer wire connected to.

 

You might want to find out what they used as a ground source. Is it all ways best to ground at the body of the car. Next have the installer check all of his conections there is a lot of wires bihind the radio. It is posible he could have tap into the wrong power source. On the ground if he tap onto one of the wires have him disconect it and ground to the radio bracket is groundes, and make sure that all the prugs are properly conected.

 

Anybody have a wiring diagram availiable of the gauge cluster, and the wires it connects to?

I have a repair manual on my computer but I don't have those pages for some reason...
Whats wierd is that my engine temp still moves but none of the other needles do so I'm going to try to trace the plugs back to the source and go from there. I'll never go back to electronic express again...