Dash lights went out

[piper62j]

Last night the entire left hand instrument panel lights went out..  Just the speedometer lights are working..  The directional lights on the dash also stopped working..  There is no tack or center gauge panel.. this is a base model 

Does anyone have any ideas on what could be the problem?   Also, the lights that do work on the speedometer side are very dim.. 

Could it be the headlight switch?  I made sure the main plug is secured to the printed circuit.. Fuse appears to be ok.

Thanks all..

 

[midlife]

All of the dash bulbs are on the same circuit board trace, so if one works, then they all should work. My guess is that the circuit board is having problems: traces lifting or broken after the speedo bulb.

 

[piper62j]

I installed a new circuit from Ecklers.. Same problem... Still No dash lights on the left side.. The connector appears to be clean and has no broken contacts... I'll bet the fix will be a simple one once I find the problem...

 

[72HCODE]

to rule out things inspect the bulbs and sockets make sure they are working on there own. then test the new dash circuit board to make sure the lights do work. If everything is working off the car then you know the issue is with the main harness and or connector.

the twist in sockets themselves can cause lots of problems so you want to make sure they are getting good contact between the bulb and the dash circuit through the twist socket.

it doesn't hurt to test the bulbs also make sure they didn't burn out. if these are LEDS then you want to double check polarity and they are working as well.

 

[piper62j]

Thanks 72Hcode.. Those tests are next on the agenda.. No LEDs' to contend with, just the old incandescent bulbs.. I will post the fix when I find it..

 

[piper62j]

Update.. The problem was all the little bulb holders.. the bulbs would not make any type of electrical contact due to oxidation down inside the sockets. I repaired and tested what was possible and replaced the remaining sockets. I now have dash lights.. This was very strange because the entire left side of the instrument cluster went out at the same time.. I also repaired and tested the sockets on the right side to avoid pulling the cluster out again..

Job done..