Date:         Mon, 31 Oct 2016 01:00:10 -0400
Reply-To:     David Beierl <dbeierl@ATTGLOBAL.NET>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         David Beierl <dbeierl@ATTGLOBAL.NET>
Subject:      Re: Another one of those grounding issues
Comments: To: Neil2 <vidublu@GMAIL.COM>
In-Reply-To:  <CAGzDsVaxf+P_F369dy+V0BUNa1zxG6rS=Z5CptKvdvpWv8A_PQ@mail.g
              mail.com>
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At 14:13 10/30/2016, Neil2 wrote:
>For months I've had an intermittent open symptom/s in my dash.  The clock
>and now the tach lights work when they choose.  If I slap the dash cover it
>has caused them to assert but unless it is humidity (likely)

Instead of slapping it, that's the time when you want to get in with
your meter and find out where the trouble is.  Can't fix it when it
isn't broken.

Clock has separate power, likeliest place is poor contact at the
panel connector.  Tach  light  will  prolly either be bad contact at
the light or if it's an incandescent busted filament that temporarily
welds itself together when you hit it.  A lot of the  LED panel
lights I've seen have seriously nasty contact ears that will tear up
the foil on the flex circuit, beware.  Aside from that just grasp the
thing with pliers and turn it 90 degrees either way, no huhu.  The
flex circuit is quite robust unless it's delaminating, in which case
treat with extreme caution.

Yrs,
d

>  I don't know
>what to look into.  I tried to remove the tach lamp holder from the mount a
>few weeks ago and was unsuccessful (paranoid about the film circuit and
>plastic in general).  I suspect I caused one 'open' when screwing with the
>lamp but perhaps a second and root cause of both a ground crown.