Replaced the HUD dimmer

[Guest Anonymous]

I have been plauged with a bad HUD dimmer switch for quite some time now, I beleive I had made previous posts in reference to it.

 

One thing that was wrong with it was this: When it got too warm in the car, either in summer or with the heat on, the HUD would fade out. The solder contacts would either expand, shrink, or whatever, and caused it to Dim out.

 

Second, the HUD ADJUST lever was snapped off when i got the car, and adjusting it was very difficult. It also made some wierd clicking noise, and the image pretty much had to stay where it was.

 

I had a spare so I gutted it down, and upon visual inspection, the contacts and solder joints appeared to be much better than the original ones. 5 small hex-bit screws removed the upper portion of the chip that controled all of this HUD jazz. Once the top was off, I removed the old adjustemnt slider, and slid the cable and ball into the new one. I had to realign the dimmer sliders so that they matched, and snadwiched the upper and the lower pieces back togther and rescrewed them.

 

I reused the old housing becuase I had to remove about 3/8" off the end so it would clear the ENG MET switch. The old screw holes didnt light up, and i ahd been using double sided tape to keep the HUD dimmer pod in place. Now, i drilled new screw holes into the top of the digital wiper pod, and attached it with the screws. The HUD dimmer is now dimming and adjustin g properly as it should. Some pics:

 

Replaced

 

The old hulk with broken adjustment slider.

[Prospeeder]

is that where ur dimmer is stock? Mines on the Lighting pod not the windshield wiper pod. Glad you got it all fixed

[LukeZ34]

That's where the dimmer and adjustment was for the 89 model year. They moved it in 1990.

[Justin]

Weird, since that's exactly where my adjuster was on my '91 GP. So they moved it twice in 2 years?

[Guest Anonymous]

The HUD dimmers moved to the Wiper pod in 1991 (on coupes)... 89 and 90 TGP's have it under the headlight pod, but they also had the adjustment on the HUD itself. I'm not sure where 90 TSTE's got it. The HUD dimmer pod is where it always was, but when I switched the wiper pods over to the early digital type i had to recess it a bit to clear the eng/met switch.

[digitaloutsider]

90 TSTE's never got HUD.

[Gearhead43]

I reused the old housing becuase I had to remove about 3/8" off the end so it would clear the ENG MET switch.

 

Dude, You did it the hard way... You did not need to remove anything to get it to fit... All you had to do was use a 1/8" Wood dowel cut to fit, and laid across the front of the HUD Dimmer switch.. It would have "dropped" it down far enough to clear the E/M switch.... And the screw holes would have lined up perfect....

[Crimson Fury Z]

the face of the dimmer lights up!?

[Garrett Powered]

the face of the dimmer lights up!?

yes, unless you fried the light inside like me. No biggie.

 

At least he got one fixed. I had to pay like $75 like 3-4 years ago to the stealership for one. Now I got a spare outa my parts car in case it breaks.

[Guest Anonymous]

I reused the old housing becuase I had to remove about 3/8" off the end so it would clear the ENG MET switch.

 

Dude, You did it the hard way... You did not need to remove anything to get it to fit... All you had to do was use a 1/8" Wood dowel cut to fit, and laid across the front of the HUD Dimmer switch.. It would have "dropped" it down far enough to clear the E/M switch.... And the screw holes would have lined up perfect....

 

Damn... The only thing i would see happening is that there would be a gap between the HUD dimmer and the wiper pod. In any case, i dislike this style of dimmer. I loved my 95's HUD that had the electronic adjustment (no cables).

[pwmin]

cool. my hud dims out sometimes too and i found a writeup but never read it. so, all i have to do is resolder some of the contacts in the dimmer switch? thought i had to take apart the hud unit. if thats the case, then that rocks. maybe ill do it

[TeeJay3800]

Looks cool. I like the design of the loaded GP pre-'94 interior. Lots of buttons.

[Guest Anonymous]

Looks cool. I like the design of the loaded GP pre-'94 interior. Lots of buttons.

 

Thanks, i love my interior as well. Its alot nicer than my 95's interior. There are a few things i liked better in the 95, the HUD and the SWRC were alot better. I find the 92's SWRC cumbersome. But the 92's DIC, million way seats, digital cluster, and the radio is much nicer.

 

DAVE I meant to ask you, do you have the "Check Gauges" and low fuel output to the HUD in your car? I lost those when i converted over to the 89 digital gauges. is there any way to get it back?

[pwmin]

fuck you then, ross

[Gearhead43]

Looks cool. I like the design of the loaded GP pre-'94 interior. Lots of buttons.

 

Thanks, i love my interior as well. Its alot nicer than my 95's interior. There are a few things i liked better in the 95, the HUD and the SWRC were alot better. I find the 92's SWRC cumbersome. But the 92's DIC, million way seats, digital cluster, and the radio is much nicer.

 

DAVE I meant to ask you, do you have the "Check Gauges" and low fuel output to the HUD in your car? I lost those when i converted over to the 89 digital gauges. is there any way to get it back?

 

 

Yeap..... Use the TGP cluster... It has the 2 wires for the CGL and Low Fuel

[Guest Anonymous]

well, my 92 cluster had the CGL and LF outputs, but the digital one doesn't... my guess is that there is no way to regain those with the digital dash.

[GnatGoSplat]

You can make it work if your digital dash has those lights.

I believe the bulbs are +12V common and a ground turns them on. Just connect their ground ends to the HUD and they should work.

That is, if it's really 12V common like I think and not ground common.

[Guest Anonymous]

The digital dash does not have a low fuel or check gauges light. For a low fuel warning, the fuel part that lights up in the digital part flashes. The gauges have individual warning lights.

[TeeJay3800]

Looks cool. I like the design of the loaded GP pre-'94 interior. Lots of buttons.

 

Thanks, i love my interior as well. Its alot nicer than my 95's interior. There are a few things i liked better in the 95, the HUD and the SWRC were alot better. I find the 92's SWRC cumbersome. But the 92's DIC, million way seats, digital cluster, and the radio is much nicer.

Yeah I love the fact that the GP SWRC's have a TUNE button for the radio. My Cutlass only has a seek control which makes it impossible to tune the radio to weaker stations using the wheel controls.