Fixed floor shift light - dash lights out now.

[Jamie]

On my 1985 245 I had no floor shift light. I pulled the plastic cover
off the shift to see 2 wires - 1 red and 1 red/white. The red/white
was cut. I repaired this and the light came on. So, I reassembled
everything and then tested - no light. Not only no more floor light -
the dash lights went out.

I checked the fuse panel (I never saw fuses like that before) - but
the fuse for the dash/ rear fog lights checked out OK. I'm thinking I
shorted something. Still - no floor lights and no dash lights.

Any ideas?

Second thing, probably unrelated - under the driver's dash panel in
the upper right is a cluster of wires and a red wire is not connected
to anything. Tomorrow I'll upload a photo. Just curious.

Thanks!
Jamie

 

[Jamie]

Here is the photo of the red wire. This would be to the top right of
the driver kick panel. The column is the steering column.

http://new.photos.yahoo.com/jamiebabineaux/photo/294928804244013466/0

 

[James Sweet]

On my 1985 245 I had no floor shift light. I pulled the plastic cover
off the shift to see 2 wires - 1 red and 1 red/white. The red/white
was cut. I repaired this and the light came on. So, I reassembled
everything and then tested - no light. Not only no more floor light -
the dash lights went out.

I checked the fuse panel (I never saw fuses like that before) - but
the fuse for the dash/ rear fog lights checked out OK. I'm thinking I
shorted something. Still - no floor lights and no dash lights.

Any ideas?

It sounds like you shorted something and burned out the dimmer rheostat,
I did that on my dad's 240 a few years ago.

Second thing, probably unrelated - under the driver's dash panel in
the upper right is a cluster of wires and a red wire is not connected
to anything. Tomorrow I'll upload a photo. Just curious.

That sounds like the tach wire, I'm assuming the car doesn't have a tach
installed in the cluster?

 

[Jamie]

Here is another link to the photo
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jamiebabineaux/398321690/

 

[Jamie]

Nope, no tach.

I'll pull the dash cover and see if I can fix.

Thanks!

 

[James Sweet]

Here is another link to the photo
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jamiebabineaux/398321690/

Yep, that's the tach lead. It's handy that they prewired all the '81 and
later 240s for that option.

 

[Jamie]

You da man! I pulled the cover off the dash panel, saw the wires to
the dimmer, reached underneath and unplugged those wires. I spliced
the wires together and everything came on.

Thanks!