The display above the radio & central air vents should show clock, temperature, and the radio settings.
For several months it has only been half illuminated - so one side was virtually invisible - presumably there are two lamps behind it and one had failed.
Now nothing is visible so presumably the other lamp has failed.
How easy is it to get the assembly apart to replace the bulbs? Is it practical for a competent DIY person?
Thanks ...
Yes, they just have ordinary bulbs , but you need good skills to change them, the unit on the top is screwed in place, unfortunately they have hidden the screws behind the air vents, they must be removed first, this is the difficult bit. You need to pull the vents straight back toward you while pressing in the sides of the vents to release the knobs of plastic that the vent rotates on. Once you have got one side of one vent released by prying with something thin, flat and wide, repeat for the second side. Then breathe gently for a little while, examine the vent you have removed, understand how it works and remove the other one. Then undo the two screws, lift the console, unplug it and then you can change the bulbs, change them all so you never have to do it again. Reassembling is really easy and obvious. Imagine the fun it was discovering how to do this the first time.
He he, that is all so true. Once you know how it goes together and where they've sneekily hidden the clips and which way they face, bend and lock you're alright...
I've certainly found it's the slow flexing and pulling that tends to break things - short sharp shocks are the order of the day but when you don't know where to be applying the force that's not much help!
As for the feeling when you discover a screw that holds the whole thing together hiding away it's somewhere mixture between 'aha - now it'll be easy' to 'oh my God - if I'd pulled much harder I would've snapped it in two'!
On this, the air vents were easy! Gentle pressure with a medium screwdriver prized the vents out, to expose 4 Torx screws. Remove these; the silver plastic dress panel between the CD player and the clock is loose, but does not want to come out.
Remove hazard flasher button from the centre of this assembly - no better. Try to remove housing for hazard flasher switch - as I do this the whole assembly comes out! What I've been trying to do - quite unnecessarily - it to separate the silver front-piece from the black back-piece of this assembly - it's held together by plastic barbs. So re-assemble this and leave dangling on the cable to the hazard flasher switch.
Now I can see and remove the two screws that release the clock console. Unplug it - examination shows two pea-bulbls in green plastic housings. Testing with 12v supply shows they are both dead - so a trip to the local garage tomorrow to get replacements.
Thank you !
Must be a newer one than I have done, however, pretty similar, well done.
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