Dash Lights Stopped Working!?!?!?!?!?

[Italia]

Everything was working fine. i pulled out my stock instrument panel, cause i had a custom gauge cluster panel fabricated. I am going to be using Autometer gauges. drove the truck home one night and noticed NONE of the lights that were in the stock panel were on. Figured it was just cause they were not grounded.... (they originally got ground from being plugged into back of stock panel)
So out of curiosity i plugged them all back into back of stock panel to see if thats what it was.... NOTHING. I checked all fuses and made sure there were no shorts in wire. i then tried running power wire straight to fuse box and turned on my parking lights (which SHOULD turn those dash lights on) still nothing. I have tried several different things and cant get lights to turn on when i turn on parking lights or headlights. I ran a wire to the brake light fuse, and the lights turn on.... BUT they are on ALL the time cause the brake light fuse has constant power to it. I cant get power from parking light/headlight switch from fuse box..... Any suggestions guys?????? I dont think i need to replace harness, cause everything else works perfect.

Thanks in Advance!!!

[fleetsidelarry]

sounds like the resistor in the headlight switch is funky. did you try turning the knob back and forth to see if the resistor has a dead spot?

[Italia]

Thanks Larry, i tried turning the knob and still nothing.

I ran a wire straight to the tail light wire on the back of the switch itself, Which turns on when parking lights are switched on, and stays on when driving lights are on. hooked the wires up to an old set of gauges and Walla..... works perfect. is it ok to have this wire running straight into the switch instead of it running to the fuse box like it was originally???

I dont have a clue why the Original (Gray) wire went dead. checked it all the way to the fuse box and its fine. I will just run all my new gauges to the back of the switch if it is safe to do so. What do you guys think???
Thanks!

[Italia]

Here is a pic of my new gauge panel by the way.

[fleetsidelarry]

Italia, you'll be ok with that, just remember that that wire you just ran isn't fused. Thelight switch in my '48 coupe is wired like that. Lots of us wire our park lights to the headlight wire so the park lights are on when the headlights are on, similar thing. It wasn't clear from your first post whether you had grounded your old panel while it was out and you were trying to get the old lights to work, but all your new gauges have separate ground wires (which I assume you've grounded appropriately) so ground shouldn't be the culprit.

If you still care, check to see if you have current to both sides of the dash light fuse holder. I say this 'cause random fuses in my truck sometimes decide to quit conducting, even though the fuse is OK. like, I'll have current to the spring-clip fuse holder on one side of the fuse, current through the fuse, but no current into the other holder. if I pop the fuse in and out a couple of times it'll start working again. other than that, Id have to say that the variable resistor in your light switch is kaput.

your panel looks great! let's see it with the gauges installed. If those are LED hi-beam and turn signal lights, let me know how you like them. I had to take mine out, they were too bright, but they were a lot bigger. My coupe has little ones like you have but I haven't wired them yet.

[jonzcustomshop]

did your new panel defeat the factory ground?
the ground is from the cluster being screwed to the dash.

[Italia]

Thanks guys, i think i will leave it hooked up to the switch.... maybe i will run an inline fuse just to be safe. i will post pics with gauges when i receive them.