A6 instrument lighting

[Lee Levitt]

RicebalLDR at aol.com writes:

>         Hi, The wife's car 1997 A6 Avant has two areas of the instrument
> cluster that is no longer are illuminated. One is the area
> between the tach
> and speedo and contains the outside air temp display and the other is the
> gear display (automatic trans). Can these be repaired? Dealer states that
> whole units need replacing. Are they diodes instead of bulbs? Thankfully I
> drive a 1991 20v. Any info would be appreciated.. Richard

Dealer must have a boat payment due. There are replaceable bulbs between the
speedo and tach. The outside air temp display has a soldered bulb, but
that's replaceable too, by someone who knows what they're doing.

I'm not sure about the gear display, but I'd be willing to bet it's a series
of replaceable bulbs.

Any good independent mechanic should be able to take care of this for you
for $1 in parts and $75 in labor.

Or you could do it yourself and take the wife out to dinner on the $75.
There's a complete writeup of the IC removal on urs4.com at:
http://www.urs4.com/technical/interior/interior_trim.html

There shouldn't be major differences between the writeup and what you need
to do for your A6. (famous last words!)

HTH,

Lee
'95.5 S6 avant
'96 A6 quattro avant