02yoyo

The instrument panel on my 2002 4runner (Gas, Temp, speedo and tach) have been slowly dying over the last 5 years possibly. At first it was just the right edge of the speedo and also, strangely, the fan position switch for the heat/ac. It would come and go. One day the edge of the speedo and the fan switch would not light up and other days it would be fine. Sometimes it would start off not working then suddenly come on. Note; this was not the entire dash cluster but merely the edge of the instrument cluster in conjunction with the fan switch.

A few days ago, in addition to the right edge, the left edge went dim in the same manner. The temp gauge was dark while part of the tach (the left side) were dim and slowly got brighter toward the center. In other words, the center of the instrument panel was bright then dimmed out to darkness at each side. Fan control switch also out.

Finally, tonight it was completely out. Entire dash and the fan control switch. I checked the dimmer switch and nothing changed. (Dimmer did work even when it was fading to black on the edges).

So, I don't think this is fuse related because if it were, I think it would just go out and not come back one. I also don't think it would dim out. I have been wrong before though. I pulled out a few fuses from the panel to see if there was an obvious bad one and I didn't find one. I was dark out and cold as ˟˟˟˟e too so I could have missed it. I didn't look for any fuses under the hood either.

My thoughts are bulb or faulty wiring. I do have 4 inches of lift, 1 inch of which is a body lift so something could be pulled tight or maybe rubbing in a weird way causing a short? I also has a small fender bender in the front a few years back. Nothing major just a new bumper. Finally, I sunk this truck almost up to the windows on the drivers side about 6 or 7 years ago. I had to pull all the carpet and seats out and pressure wash everything and hose out the tub. Could this be some water damage finally rearing it's head?

I'll say no more.