Dash lights not working properly

[jhstatts]

I have only had my 60 for about three weeks now (if that long). When I picked it up the PO told me that the dash light knob needed to be "jiggled" to operate. Well, I did find the sweet spot and it worked up until last night. All my other lights work properly (aside from the front side markers, which I am working on now).

Any suggestions to find the short and fix it? I am not that much of an electrician.

Thanks.

 

[fsusteve]

IIRC, the side marker lights, dash lights and maybe tail lights work on the same fuse, maybe. Check there, on my 62 I shorted out a side marker light messing with it, and the rest went with the fuse.

 

[swank60]

I've had weird light issues too because of shorts and stuff, but I'd bet the short you have is in that rheostat. It's part of the circuit that runs everything. If you replace it, that might do it.

If you don't want to go new, give James and cruiserparts.net a call, and I'll bet he's got a rheostat for cheap. Check your fuses first though - that's free. If you could figure out a way to bypass the rheostat, that would be a good test to make sure everything works. (I just think that's it because of your need for wiggling)

 

[jhstatts]

That is probably what happened, steve. I was tinkering with the side marker lights yesterday afternoon... too much of a coincidence that the dash lights would go out that same night. I didn't check the tail lights last night, so I will start there. Thanks.

 

[jhstatts]

Thanks, Swank. Will check on that, too.

 

[Jman]

IIRC, the side marker lights, dash lights and maybe tail lights work on the same fuse, maybe. Check there, on my 62 I shorted out a side marker light messing with it, and the rest went with the fuse.

Yeah, quite a surprise for me--I was messing with my front headlight when my crumbling side marker light came apart too, the leads touched, fried the fuse, and voila, no tail lights. And I was on the side of the highway. And I only had one head light. So I had to drive about 25 miles at night with only one headlight. Do you know how many times people drive up your ass and flash their brights at you in 25 miles? Lots.

 

[swank60]

HA!

when I blew my lights out - and I still don't know exaclty what did it (I think it's a combo of having the door open/dome light on, starting the truck and having the fan or parking lights on or the brake lights on) - it blew out the lights in the Tach & guage cluster (speedo light was fine) the dome light, the front marker lights (white ones by the head lights), the license plate lights and the fusable link. Didn't loose one fuse, and they're all the right size, too (great job, fuses!). Took me forever to figure out the fusable link was blown though. I was able to trace it down because if I was running the fan on full blast, and I'd hit the blinker, the radio would go off every time the light would flash.

Sometimes I think Rube Goldberg designed the electrical system in the 60...it's nuts.

 

[zuluzeugma]

I worked at a stereo repair shop for 4 years. We sprayed WD40 in the pots. and then twisted them a bunch. All this does is clean the dirt out of them. I would be suprised if this didn't work in your case. Try doing that first.

In my 4 years of repair, we never once got a unit returned for the same "static in volume control" that it came with.

 

[jhstatts]

UPDATE:

Well, I changed out a fuse or two and now my dash lights work properly (they even dim with the dimmer... they didn't do that before). So this dilemma is solved. Thanks for all the help everyone.