speedometer temperature and fuel gauge not working

[lesleymac99]

Help please! I am not mechanical. Our local garage looked at the fuel gauge never reading full - I see from the forum now that this is a common problem and we should have tried to earth it, but he took off the dashboard -fuel read same amount, reconnected the dashboard and the temperature gauge reset to hottest, fuel gauge went to full and speedometer stopped working. He wondered if we should get another dashboard ? 2nd hand. Does any of this make sense and does anyone have any ideas? Thanks, Lesley

[g8dhe]

The fuel gauge has to be driven to a new reading, so when disconnected or switched off it continues to stay at the same position!
This is a slightly unusual situation as most gauges return to zero by a spring.
However in this situation its sounds like the garage have not reconnected the display console correctly It has several plugs on the rear I'm wondering if they have managed to do something funny here! The plugs are actually different so they can't be connected incorrectly, but I just wonder ....... strikes me they need to look again at what they have done!
What year and engine type is your vehicle ?
Oh and welcome to the forum!

[lesleymac99]

thanks
1999 and diesel

[Northern Bongolow]

sounds like a speedo chip problem, did he find a mystery little box screwed on the back of the dash then left it off or part disconnected maybe.

[lesleymac99]

thanks! Will get all checked

[Simon Jones]

I wonder if he tried tightening the screws on the PCB that secure the dials? The danger with over tightening these is that it rotates the brass posts that carry the signal to the coils on the dials and it's very easy to snap the fine copper wires which can result is the needles going to one end of the scale or the other.

These are some of the screws:



This shows a break in one of the wires to the temperature guage coils:



These are the threaded holes in the rear of the temp/fuel gauges that have the brass posts on the other side that the coils are soldered to:

[lesleymac99]

Very helpful, thanks

[lesleymac99]

It's actually a 1997. There doesn't seam to be any box attached to the back of the PCB at all, should there be? Other than that the display console seams to be fine, all the wires are in good condition and none are broken. However the speedometer, fuel gauge and temperature gauge still don't seem to be working. Is there a way to test if they are getting the correct signal?

[g8dhe]

Are your dashboard lights flashing ON, when you turn the Ignition key for the self-test ?
If they are then the fuse is OK, if they aren't then look at this fuse;

[lesleymac99]

The lights do come on when the ignition key is turned. That fuse is okay but the 10A in the top left and the 2 15A 2nd and 3rd in from the top right are not there. Is there a fuse box diagram somewhere as there just listed in Japanese?

[philpdr]

Do you have a leisure battery fitted?some fuses are removed to patch in a Willinton split charge kit.

[g8dhe]

Sounds like you have a LB fitted, but all the fuses, lights and wiring diagrams are available on the on-line wiring diagrams site;