Disco 1 Dash lights out tail lights on!!

Hi All,

I have some woes that I'm hoping someone might be able to shed some light on...literally, I have a 1998 300 TDI Jap import and recently the dash and console illumination have all gone out completely. I still have warning lights ie indicators, full beam, glowplugs etc but absolutely no illumination anywhere, the only thing that still comes on with the headlights is the glovebox light.

I have done some research and checked the usual suspects like the rear side light fuse, in fact, every fuse on the car but am none the wiser. It also gets a little stranger because usually when you put the lights on, the clock and stereo and some of the things that illuminate during the day get dimmer to make them easier on the eye, however, this is no longer happening. When you turn the lights on the clock and stereo flicker momentarily to the night mode then remain as they usually are when the car is being used without headlights.

I'm wondering is there a relay or something that controls this or indeed any help would be greatly appreciated.

Many thanks in advance Tim

I suspect either an earth issue - how regularly do you check your earth straps? and how much corrosion is there on the front inner wing behind the battery where the main body earth point is?

Have you got RAVE ?

(Or ....) Once you have RAVE, I'd be trying to initiate the self test of the MFU - the multifunction unit which controls much of the "automatic" side of the lights - like the HRW timer etc....

The MFU is quite expensive if it is kaput, so hopefully it's a simple earth issue

Thanks for the advice, that actually makes sense as I noticed the dash out after replacing the battery maybe I disturbed something?

I don't have RAVE do you think it's worth getting?

the_riddler said:

I don't have RAVE do you think it's worth getting?

Click to expand...

- it's free. It's geniune. What's not to like?

ok so I have re earthed the cables that are attached to the pin cleaned up the contacts etc and so far no joy , anything else before I start dismantling the dash?

Have you tried running a new earth cable from the battery to the earth points of the cluster ?

"Our" resident electrical genius is @sierrafery - perhaps he has some more ideas .....

The two multi earth points you’re looking for will be one behind the driver and the other behind the passenger footwell kick panel, near the banks of relays, unless there’s be interference in that area the connection should be okay as their position is out of harms way.