90q intermittent speedo, dash rattle #1

[Tom Nas <tnas@euronet.nl>]

Hi all,

Took my dash apart yesterday (dead easy: 2 screws in the steering column
shroud, take that off and two more screws that hold in the instrument panel
are revealed) to fix an intermittent speedo. The dash is hooked up with
three connectors: white, yellow and blue. As the blue one was nearest to
the speedo, I guessed that was the one. I sprayed some contact cleaner on
both the dash contacts and the connector, and reseated/took off the
connector a number of times. When reinstalling the dash, I found out why
this bad connection keeps on coming up: the blue connector is the only one
that sticks out and gets hit when you reinstall the dashboard.
Reinstallation must be done carefully, to avoid pushing the blue connector
out again. It seems to work fine for now, at least.
I had one spare light bulb left, so this went into the dash.

While rummaging through my dash, I found out the cause of one of the
rattles driving me nuts- the alarm module (installed by the previous owner)
was lying around loose behind the dash and rattling against the firewall.
Ah. Got out a bit of neoprene I used to have for repairing sufing wetsuits,
wrapped the alarm module in that and sealed it with duct tape. Hey presto,
rattle gone. To prevent the alarm wires from squeaking between the dash, I
wrapped them in electric insulation tape.

I then checked the driver's seat backrest- it looks like Phil's right and
there's a cracked weld. There's a significant amount of play in the inside
top of the backrest, and it squeaks like mad. At least it's straight again
for now- I'll dismantle it later to fix the seat heater and the cracked
weld.

Today I'm going to take apart the front bumper to fix minor collision
damage and realign one headlight, and replace a sandblasted fog light.
If there's any time left I'll investigate the dead rear strut and seized
rear inner brake caliper.

Tom