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Old 08-07-2014, 11:14 AM
firstyearta's Avatar
firstyearta firstyearta is offline
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Location: Tooele, Utah
Posts: 359
Default 2002 GTP dash light problem

I have a friend with a 2002 Grand Prix GTP that is having a problem with his dash lights. Here is his question....

I finished cleaning all of the fuse contacts so that is eliminated as a potential cause. Here's what we have now:

The car was designed to automatically dim dash lights, (speedo, tach, radio, info center, etc) at night. After working fine since 2002, about 6 months ago, this feature malfunctioned; now, instead of dimming normally, the dash lights almost entirely dim down, to the degree that at night there is essentially no light visible from these instruments.

The daytime brightness of these lights is still quite bright, no problem at all.

The sensor (where ever it is) that controls this still seems to work; when driving at dusk, the lights will go from bright to none as the outdoor ambient light decreases. I also have been able to reproduce this when I move the car from a driveway in the daylight to a dark garage. While the vehicle is still in the dark garage, if I then turn the key to the off position and then restart, the dash lights come on in the bright mode and will not dim (even though I am in a dark garage) UNTIL I release the foot brake. Then the lights dim down to nothing. So surprisingly, the footbrake switch is some how involved the the sensor's working.

Haven't found anything like this problem from internet searches. Sure hate spend a lot of money at a GM dealership to fix this. Electrical systems some times turn into black holes for cash....

Thanks for any thoughts?

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  #2  
Old 08-07-2014, 08:07 PM
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Lightfoot Lightfoot is offline
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Location: The Banana Republic
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Doesn't this car have the dial off to the side of the HL switch, which would dim or brighten the dash lights, plus turn on the overhead light when turned to the full 'ON' position?
That's what I'd be checkin'.

If not that, have someone watch the brake lights to see what they're doing when the dash is bright with your foot on the pedal.
Sounds like a poor ground for the dash light circuit, if that has anything to do with it.


Last edited by Lightfoot; 08-07-2014 at 08:14 PM.
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