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You may already know this, but if you disconnected the battery at anytime, the ECU will lose its learned settings and have to relearn them over the course of a few hours of driving. So the idle may be a bit off for awhile. Also, when warm, idle in park or neutral should be about 950. Idle in a gear like D, 2, 1 with the brakes applied is more like 750. The ranges on these values are +/- 50 rpm.

Just wanted to share this with the community and potentially help someone save a couple hundred bucks. Sorry there are no pictures. I was having problems with my drl's, more specifically, they were not working. The vehicle is a canadian 1998 SE. The regular light were fine as were the high beams. Instead of dropping 200 on a new module (or there abouts), I pulled the module out. On the 1998, it is a 3"X2"X1" black plastic box located in the engine compartment on the passenger side wheel well hidden by the battery. So removal of the battery and disconnecting the 2 wire harnesses and one bolt allows removal of the module. The module can be disassembled, but a fair amount of force is required. the wire harness end pulls out of the plastic cover revealing a circuit board. In my case, one of the 2 larger components (presumably relays) had a questionable solder arguably caused by significant electrical currents, heat and age. Anyways, I resoldered that connection, popped the unit back together and reinstalled. Et voila, drls were fine again. So, in summary, if you are handy enough to do the above, this could be a possible solution if you daytime running lights are not working. Note, with the module removed, you will have no lights. So it is possible, other headlight issues could be caused by a faulty circuit in the drl module.

the ony way you can proactively kill it by accident is if you damage the platinum heating elements/wires. dont forget to pull the battery and let the ecm reset. it may then run a bit rough for about 20 minutes as it relearns all the parameters (paraphrasing the manuals). or you could let it throw a code if cleaning made a huge difference, then as you clear the code, the ecm looks for new parameters for the MAF without messing with the other stored parameters. if it is bad mileage, cleaning MAF is a good/inexpensive thing to do. if the maf is damaged or dying, driveability will suffer (ie. bad idle, stalling, etc.)

Thanks for the input. Some of those CRC contact cleaners are mostly alcohol based (which supports their claim of being safe on plastics, and presumably rubber). I 'll remove the unit so I can tilt so the cleaner runs out and away from teh rest of the unit (as the knob is on the corner ). I like what you are saying about the shops just cleaning it "9 times out of 10". But is this from first hand experience? Thanks again, -pete

Silverlion, Did you do this on the Bose stereo? just remove the knob and shoot or is there a special angle or place you have to get that cleaner into? thanks,

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apparently, the head units are clarion. either way, someone was supposed to be responsible for quality control. Anyways, it is interesting to hear other peoples experiences and the actions they took.

I do that "kind of" stuff also. Pressure in all directions as well as a slight pulling or pushing. I can live with it, but sometimes the volume gets uncontrollably loud and I resort to shutting the unit off until I have the courage to start it up again and attempt to lower the volume. I dont know whether to drop some money to get a replacement unit from ebay for 100-180$ (which is a 10 year old unit designed with the same potential flaw) or yank the stuff out. Needless to say, in subsequent vehicles, I did not value Bose as an upgrade that I would be willing to pay extra for. Another option is to try replacing the encoder such as posted on fixya.com.

1998 SE 4X4 (canadian), black/ tan leather, tire carrier, limited slip, block heater, bose, auto, class 3 hitch, wind deflector, side bars. I am fairly mechanical. Vehicle has never been in the shop as I do all the work myself. Solo-ed the timing belt last winter in a leisurely 8 hours. I've searched the archives, but still have some unanswered questions (maybe there is new info or knowledge out there): Bose volume knob going. DRLs no longer working, now its like a US model. Looking for a set of OEM rims, 17s preferrably, but will consider 16s (I am in SoCal). Are power windows adjustable. I seem to have one that rolls all the way up, but when you let off the button, the window slides down a hair, but enough to cause some wind noise on the highway. Looking forward to hearing your comments.