I have a 1992 Maxima and the Dashboard lights are fading in and out, its dim all the time now. I cannot use my dimmer switch anymore, it just stays partially dim. I do not notice anything else that is dim or not lit at all in my car. I figured if it were a fuse, it would have blown already and I wouldnt be getting any dashboard lights at all. ANyone ever come across this problem before? Thanks for the help in advance.

 

Go to the Junkyard and get a dimmer switch. It should be cheap.

 

Thanks for the reply. I will try that.

 

If that doesn't work, you might pull the TCU as well.

-Sean

 

Well I left the car off overnight. came back in it last night, and to my surprise, my taillights, dashboard,shifter lights,and fog lights are all not working now. Really wierd.

 

This may be a little far-fetched, but maybe it's the voltage regulator.

 

I found out it was a fuse that was blown (tail lamp fuse). So I replaced it with another #10 fuse and worked fine for like an hour or 2. Then the dashboard just started flashing out of nowhere again. I then put in another replacement and it worked fine. Now, I did have my phone chager in the ciggarette lighter. I did put that into my ciggarette lighter 2 days ago, this is when it started happening. My ciggarette lighter may be shorting out. I will confirm tommorow on my progress. thanks for the replies guys.

 

yeah dont feel bad it use to happen to me all the time due to a bad tail light socket

 

sounds more like the adapter than the lighter

 

Well, I tried this, but as soon as I backed my car up, the fuse blew up again. I didnt have anything plugged into the ciggarette lighter either. I really dont know this would be doing this. The only thing I did in the recent past, was install my amp with subwoofer like a week ago. I dont think this would cause this though. Makes no sense to me. I will start looking for a short basically everywhere in my car.

 

I'd check the AMP wiring then.

 

I unplugged my Amp power + , so far its been a day, and it is working. I still cannot fathum the fact that this could be intermitting with the lighting in my car.

 

that means something is wired a bit off

 

Hmmm. When the dashboard lights went out, so did my illumination light on my Alpine radio. Could be something with the illumination wire. BLAH!

 

Well, After 2 days of my lights staying on. They shut down again. I did not have my amp plugged in(powered on), but it still went dead. This is what happened.
When the lights in my car started going out, it started fading in and out. Then, when I hit my brakes, the actual lights in my car would fade to a lower illumination. I would release the brakes and it would come back up normal. Then the lights in my car just went dead. (back lights, dashboard, shifter lights, A/C lights, ect). Anyone have a clue on what to do next? I may have to check every connection to see if there is a short. But since it doesnt pop the fuse as soon as it starts breaking, I wont be able to find the short. I am going to take out my radio and see if I can wiggle some wires.

Any suggestions?

 

^^^^^ bump ^^^^^

 

I believe I solved this problem. I noticed that every time I hit my brakes, my dashboard lights, shifter lights would come on, even though the headlights were off. So , I figured why don't I check to see if the brake lights/bulbs are damaged. Well I found one that looks like it had filiment all over the outside, where the positive and negative meet up0and it was touching both. So when I would brake, the normally off would actually be normally on. So far everything has been running great. So if anyone has this problem, apparently the brake lights(bake tail lights), dash, shifter lights, even radio lights are all connected into this fuse. Hope this helps other people with similar problems.