No heater or speedo lights

[XantiaDaveEire]

Evening gents

I went to get my lights alinged this evening and all dashboard and heater lights were working,when i came out nothing .This happened twice before but came on after a few minutes.

I never trust any of these places so i have my suspiscions that they may have done something as the car wasn't in view whilst i was in the waiting room.

I've checked fuses and all are fine,The only lamp that is illuminated is for the headlights,air con and hazard light ,basically the whole car is in darkness

I have my NCT at 8 tommorow morning and spent all day getting her up to scratch this is bloody typical

Anyone have any ideas?

Dave

[Mandrake]

Evening gents

I went to get my lights alinged this evening and all dashboard and heater lights were working,when i came out nothing .This happened twice before but came on after a few minutes.

I never trust any of these places so i have my suspiscions that they may have done something as the car wasn't in view whilst i was in the waiting room.

I've checked fuses and all are fine,The only lamp that is illuminated is for the headlights,air con and hazard light ,basically the whole car is in darkness

I have my NCT at 8 tommorow morning and spent all day getting her up to scratch this is bloody typical

Anyone have any ideas?

Dave

Really silly suggestion, but have you tried adjusting the rheostat under the steering column ? Maybe it was bumped or is getting a bit old and intermittent ?

[XantiaDaveEire]

Yep already checked

[Mandrake]

Yep already checked

If you have a multimeter I'd pop the rheostat out of its mounting spot (I'm assuming its not too hard to pop out) and measure the voltage on each side to earth. If there's no voltage on either side nothing is coming from the ignition switch/fuse (not sure off hand whether the ignition switch or fuse comes first) meaning either wiring or the ignition switch if you've already checked the fuse.

If there is voltage on one side but not the other I'd suspect a faulty rheostat - quickly bridging the two contacts should light the lights up if that's the case. If there is voltage on both sides but still no light it must be the wiring after the rheostat to the lights.

[XantiaDaveEire]

When you turn the ignition all the warning lamps light up so i'd assume there's power going to them?

It's just the heater lights and rev counter speedo etc that dont light up ,i'll have another look at it in a few minutes

[Mandrake]

There's more than one set of contacts on the ignition switch, exactly how many I'm not sure and probably depends on model, but I think its 3 or 4, as you have some devices that only run in the ignition position, some that also run in accessory, and so on... Xantia ignition switches are notorious for breaking down at a certain age, for example in series 1 models where the blower fan ran directly off the ignition switch the contacts that ran the fan would always burn out and knock out the rear window demister as well. In series 2 the blower is switched by a relay. On the V6 the ignition switch contacts that supply the starter motor wear out and cause problems with the starter not operating properly etc...

Edit: just remembered the lights in question go through the headlight switch as well, as they only come on with the headlights, and may in fact not go through the ignition switch.

[XantiaDaveEire]

Sounds like a PITA

[Mandrake]

Check the voltages at the rheostat first, that will at least divide the problem in half...

[XantiaDaveEire]

Got it sorted for now anyway and it passed the test!

It was the rheostat,a quick fiddle with it soon sorted it out

Cheers Mandrake!