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95 Digital LCD Revisited

Gorgon

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I got much of the dash apart last night. What I discovered is that the instrument panel is fed information through a connection that is maintained my pressure. With the panel pressed back in where it would be screwed in it makes contact with the connector and fully displays. It seems that if you hit a good bump and the panel was not scewed down tight enough that it could loose it's full connection and start getting jumbled. I tested this by turning the key on and pressing the panel back into the dash. Everything works and is displayed correctly. If I reduce the amount of pressure and allow it to fall forward a bit the digital LCD gets scrambled. All the other gauges work normally.

Tonight I will be borrowing a wheel puller to get the steering wheel out of the way to gain better access. I'm hoping I don't need to drop the steering column as well. This way I can determine if there is an adjustment on the connector to set the amount of pressure exerted when the IP is fully mounted in the dash.
 
Just drop the column

It will be easier......

The lever for the tilt just unscrews.. then the column will drop. Taking the wheel off will be a PIA.....



Vig!
 
Damn Vig, you're quick with the response. Didn't think about that, that the column would be that easy to drop. Then I wouldn't have had to mess with the air bag. ;) I'll check that tonight.
 
Re: Just drop the column

vigman said:
It will be easier......

The lever for the tilt just unscrews.. then the column will drop. Taking the wheel off will be a PIA.....



Vig!

I agree, you need to drop the column to fix the cluster. Taking off the Steering wheel is only making more work for yourself.. I have pulled my cluster out plenty of times now, it is easy.. just a bit nerve racking the first time. Asfor adjusting the connector I don't recall there being anything simple to do it. But I bet you could devise something
 
Well I dropped the column last night and removed the cluster. As it seemed the connector didn't make a difference I tore down the whole instrument panel. There is a connector on the back of the PCB that has wires that go to a connector on the LCD. I broke out the soldering iron and touched up the pins on the PCB that lead to the LCD connector.

I took just the PCB and LCD out to the car and pushed it into the dash and turned on the car. With the display on I flexed the PCB which did not affect the LCD so the main connector seems to be fine. Then I started moving the connector on the LCD. This would seem to be my problem point. It seems that there is a pin lifting off the LCD. The problem is it's a metal pin connected to glass for which I have no means to repair as I've never messed with an LCD before. Anyone know where I can get just the LCD? I believe if people are going to sell anything it is going to be a full remaned IP. The rest of the panel is in good working order. It would suck to replace the whole thing. Anyone have any suggestions for reattaching the pins on the glass of the LCD?
 
Hmmmmm

Can you take a PIX of the back of the dash ( cluster )

I cant recall from memory...... Might have an idea!


Vig!
 
I'll get some pix together for you. Might not be until late tonight as it's the old anniversary. That means quality time with the wife and not the girl friend. ;)
 
Tooo Funny

Ok... standing by


Vig!
 
If it turns out you need an LCD, I may have one.. I will have to look.
 
I got some time to get some pics.

Below is the picture of the dash with the cluster removed.

http://urcm.cjb.net:8080/dash/dash.jpg

This is a closer look at the connector in the dash.

http://urcm.cjb.net:8080/dash/dashcon.jpg

And then a closer shot of the connector removed from the back panel.

http://urcm.cjb.net:8080/dash/dashcon2.jpg

And here is a pic of the connector on the back of the cluster.

http://urcm.cjb.net:8080/dash/rearcon.jpg

It would seem that this is not my problem, but Vig asked for some pics.

I pulled the cluster apart as I did last night. Here you can see the PCB and the wires on the connector that connect to the LCD.

http://urcm.cjb.net:8080/dash/pcb.jpg

I took the PCB and the LCD to the car to test this again. The LCD was totally blank now until I pushed on the last pin and the display came in normally.

http://urcm.cjb.net:8080/dash/lcd.jpg

As you can see from this picture the pins are connected directly to the glass of the LCD. How am I supposed to fix this connection?

Below is a shot of the LCD plugged into the connector.

http://urcm.cjb.net:8080/dash/lcd_con.jpg

This last pic is a close-up of the connector in the last pic. If you look closely you can see the last pin lifting from the glass. How do I reattach this again?

http://urcm.cjb.net:8080/dash/lcd_con_close.jpg

When I push on this pin the LCD works perfectly. It had been intermittent until I picked at the pin and it lost all connectoin with the glass. Now it doesn't work at all. :( Jeff, if you just have the glass LCD that would be fantastic. I'm pretty sure that any place I look will only sell whole clusters. Anyone know who makes the LCD for Chevy? I wonder if they have extra stock somewhere. Besides, the reman shops have to get their parts from somewhere.
 
Phew

Ok this is a wild shot....

You will have to get the compound that they fix the wires in the heater rear glass ( rear window defroster..electric)

That paint on conductive material.. and attempt to re connect the circut..once that's complete you should epoxy the pins.. back to the glass.

I guess a less then 60 % chance of sucess.

Call wrecking yards.....

Vig!
 
I think I may have something. I brought the display into work where I could get at the pins under a microscope. I used an exacto blade to cut the adhesive and remove the bent pin. Once removed I used a set of fine needle nose pliers to bend the pin back into a position that would apply ample pressure to the glass contact. I reattached the pin to the glass and carefully used a soldering iron to melt the adhesive together. The adhesive didn't really melt much so I may have the problem again in the future, but now I have contact on the glass as I should. If this is a problem again I will remove all the adhesive and replace with. It looks like the adhesive used to attach rear view mirrors to windshields. This would probably work used sparingly as it will adhere metal to glass and will be resistant to high temps.

I'll let you know how it works this evening when I get home.
 
Success! Drove around quite a bit tonight (mostly because I missed her ;) ) and had no problems with the LCD. There are several bumpy roads that always caused problems for the display, but no problems tonight.

Thanks for listening and offering suggestions guys. We'll see how long this lasts.
 
Well great news

Congrats!



Vig!
 

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