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Instrument panel pretty fubar, any ideas?


deltantor
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Alright, so we bought a 4wd 1990 nissan pathfinder back in january, and have had a few issues with it that we have fixed, including a stuck lifter develop into a pretty bad metal on metal sound while driving it @ around 75mph, at which point we bought a 92 pathy with a stuck/bad manual tranny for -$100 (had some pretty awesome tires on it we managed to sell for $100 more than we bought the car for) and swapped the engines out. Had an oil leak after that, so we narrowed that down to a bad camshaft seal and during replacing that we realized we had a completely torn up spark plug cable so we put in new spark plugs and grabbed the cable off of the other (bad) engine and replaced it.

 

Which brings us down to the current issue, ever since we bought the vehicle the majority of the dash lights, the tachometer, fuel gauge, and water temp gauge is out. We pulled the dash out, and found a bunch of cut wires as well as a red wire with a wire nut just sitting loose back there. Was hoping it was just the dimmer switch so we bypassed that, and then had a pretty bad electric smell and the dash backlight came on pretty dim so we undid that. Wired up and put in a new voltage regulator hoping that might clear some of it up and it did nothing, even though the old VR was bad and the new one worked fine (bench tested them). The PRNDL lights do work, although they (and the clock backlight) turn off when you turn the headlights on. They do stay on though if the fuse for the brake lights is removed. The battery light is always on, same with the brake light which gets brighter if you engage the parking brakes. Did an ECU test, only thing it complained about was the oxygen sensor, replaced that with the one from the 92 pathy which fixed it. The turn signal lights work perfectly.

 

Does anybody have any idea what to do? I really wish I could get the fuel gauge working, and am really worried about the oil light not working as well, which might have been enough to save the old engine.

 

One more thing: Considering doing a rebuild on the bad VG30E engine in the next couple of months. Anyone have any information on that?

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So which wires are cut? The ones going to the back of the cluster? The old clusters have multiple connectors. You can try unplugging them one at a time and see which ones make no difference and go from there.

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So which wires are cut? The ones going to the back of the cluster? The old clusters have multiple connectors. You can try unplugging them one at a time and see which ones make no difference and go from there.

 

Not too sure on which wires. Theres a wire by the dimmer switch that I've checked and has +12vdc coming from it, and then a couple of random pink wires that are cut behind and under the dash, although we have no idea where they go.

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Do the pink wires lead into a bundled harness or do they look like they were added on? Sometimes people try to do wiring as cheap as possible so that they could get their cheap deck from Wal-mart to work and create a wiring nest or possibly a wiring hazard. They can be a pain to undo.

 

Generally speaking OEM wiring should not be accessible at all. The wires could also be an aftermarket alarm system that was taken out.

 

Then you might want to check some fuses and the fusible link at the battery and see if those are blown.

Edited by Tungsten
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Do the pink wires lead into a bundled harness or do they look like they were added on? Sometimes people try to do wiring as cheap as possible so that they could get their cheap deck from Wal-mart to work and create a wiring nest or possibly a wiring hazard. They can be a pain to undo.

 

Generally speaking OEM wiring should not be accessible at all. The wires could also be an aftermarket alarm system that was taken out.

 

Then you might want to check some fuses and the fusible link at the battery and see if those are blown.

 

 

They look like they were added on, once I have a chance tomorrow I'm going to start pulling stuff apart and figuring out where all of the wiring is going and if there are any cut wires that might match up. Really hoping that this doesn't end up being absurdly hard to fix. Almost wish I could get hold of who did this and ask them what the hell they were up to, I've done a good number of stereo installs for friends and myself and have never seen something so insanely botched. Hell, at least they got the damn stereo to work.

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Tested fusible link and all fuses, the fusible link was bad, replaced it with the okay one from the 92 pathy, brake and amp lights are off now, no other changes.

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Alright, did a lot of work and managed to fix all of the diagnostic type lights plus gauges, was a few wires being cut. Still have one issue though: The illumination lights are still non functional, plus the PRND21 lights and clock backlight still turn off when you turn the headlights on. Any ideas there? I checked the dimmer switch and it is fine.

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The clock backlight goes out when I turn my headlights on too, I think that's normal... the main dash lights illuminate it then. I don't have the PRND21 lights (the ones on the dash, correct?), so I don't know about them, but they may work similarly.

 

Keep looking for wires, I guess. Is the dimmer getting power?

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Alright, did some work and found out that the negative wire for the illumination circuit is actually giving off 12v. For the time being, I cut that wire and properly grounded it to the frame. Probably going to have to trace that wire and figure out where it goes and what is going on. The illumination lights are working now, dimmer isnt. The clock now gets lit by the illumination lights as well.

 

Only issue is that the PRND21 lights still turn off when you turn on the headlights, and I really have no clue whats going on. Not having a similar ground issue, so I'm pretty unsure. Is it possible that they are supposed to go out and that is just normal? Otherwise, I am really stumped.

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Alright, checked that fuse and it is okay. Interesting thing though: When I pull it out, illumination stops working BUT the PRND21 lights and clock backlight DO stay on with the headlights. Interesting.

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  • 1 year later...

OK. I did a search and couldn't find it, so forgive me. I know that my issue with the fuel gauge and water temp gauge no working is probably the voltage regulator behind the dash, I just need some help on how to access it. New to the whole Pathfinder thing but wanna breathe some life back into her...

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Right on... I will do a search for the regulator on fleabay. After I get the real important stuff done that will be next on the list... Hey Trog, we will do some roads soon! I'll PM my e addy and #....

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