Hello Folks,

So my 1992 960 wagon's warning light indicator panel has been intermittently shorting on and off. There are some indicators that have been on for a while (wiper fluid & SRS) but recently the entire strip will shut off as if none of the lights are on, then randomly switches on again. Concerned if an important light comes on and it's recognition is delayed due to the short. Which has already happened with the check engine light and radiator light. So it really doesn't matter what lights are on, they all go off with the glitch. Anyway, any idea where the short (faulty contact) is most likely located? Sounds to me a contact that feeds the entire light strip, but who knows? Thanks for any suggestions.

Another question... When a shop checks the engine codes and clears any (assuming they fixed them), the light should go off correct? Why I ask is my car just came back (yesterday) from the shop after having the engine light turn on, turns out the cam timing sensor connection was destroyed (by what I don't know) and causing the fault code. They replaced the sensor. As I was driving last night the warning indicator bar was all black (short related) then randomly turned on along with the check engine light. Took it in this am, they ran the diagnostics and nothing came up. Hard to tell if the light is still on since the light strip is on one of its blackout shorts, uuuugggh!

Any thoughts?

never having looked at a 960 cluster, I don't know how much they're like a 940 cluster. But I suspect they are also a Yazaki product.

My 940 cluster had a number of non-functional warning lights because of broken traces on the printed circuit. Remove the cluster, turn to the "combined instrument" page of the green book, grab your multimeter, and start checking continuity.

I successfully repaired the breaks on mine by gently scraping away a little of the insulating top-coat to expose the metal trace, then painting over the break with conductive paint from a "fix your window defroster grid" kit. But you can also buy conductive paint and paintable solder from hobby shops or electronics supply stores.

john
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1989 245 244K / 1993 945 129K

Dear jshatzer,

Hope you're well. I deferred commenting, in the hope that a Brickboarder would respond, who had a wiring diagram for a '92 960. I do not have such, as I don't own a 960.

The intermittent symptoms suggest a loose ground wire and/or a corroded ground point, or a circuit card failure.

The ground points for a '93 940 instrument cluster (the closest I have to a '92 960) are: (a) on the inner fender walls, behind each headlight unit (North American models); (b) next to the ECU, which is behind a panel on the door-side of the passenger footwell. Clean these contacts with an aerosol corrosion remover (or very find sandpaper). Apply a thin coating of di-electric grease and reconnect the ground wires.

Do not trust a visual inspection. A corrosion layer may be only a few atoms thick, so invisible to he unaided eye. Clean the contacts, coat with di-electric grease, and reconnect the ground wires.

If this ground point clean-up does not help, it will be necessary to pull the cluster and closely inspect the circuit card.

Please post back with any results from cleaning the ground points.

Hope this helps.

Yours faithfully,

Spook