QuestionRoland,
I need you help. I have this problem with my T/C. My dash lights do not come on. Nor does the climate Control lights, radio lights, the LED for the power door locks and windows. I have check all the fuses, I have replaced the headlight switch, I have tore apart the dash more then i can count. I have check the ground. All seems ok.
The thing that really bothers me is that I a can go weeks without these lights and then all of the sudden the lights will flash on and off. Sometimes the come on for an hour some times for a day. Longest yet is 3 days and the just as fast as the came on there go out again.
I have reason to think that it is the BCM (Panel Lamps Driver) but why will it keep coming back to life.
Please help
AnswerHi Mike,
I don't own a van so I can't look at it in person. But I am wondering about the connections between the the body module and junction box. I have the '98 diagrams and it shows there to be some sort of a direct connection between those two modules as regards the panel lamp driver at a #2 (but with no plug assignment so i wonder if these have an electrical interconnect with no wire connection between the two)? If so, that might be a place for an intermittent.
I also notice of course that the the headlamp switch dimmer variable resistor has to be grounded on the left cowl on a 14-incoming wire ground fitting on pin 8 of that fitting. So it would be reasonable to see whether that connection is patent to pin 2 of plug C2 at the junction block. And the signal from that resistor goes out of the headlamp switch of pin 12 of its plug C1 and goes to pin 8 of C2 of the body module. I also notice that there are many more lights run by the panel lamps driver output than the ones that you point to. That suggests to me that the problem is with the connection between that internal coupling #2 and the actual output plugs on the junction block that feed all those lights if all are affected. For the instrument cluster/climate control it is pin 8 of C4 of the body module, for the radio it is pin 1 of C4, and for the power locks it is pin 8 of C1. How about the ash receiver lamp, power mirror switch, traction control switch, rear blower front control switch: are those also affected? If so, then it has to be the body module or that internal connection; if not, then the 'structure' that branches from that to all the different plug pins on the junction block is suspect.
Finally, one reader suggested that the body module may just be line a computer, sensitive to voltage spikes (from the battery, alternator, loose/corroded battery clamps) and that you may solve it by disconnecting the battery from time to time to "reboot" module. I don't know whether that is true or not.
So do take a look at how the body module and the junction block might be directly connected to one another. Let me know if you figure this out, please. I get this question very often.
Roland
