Been taking my Hondas to the same mechanic for 22 years. Always good service, never overpriced, never foisted off anything on me that didn't need to be done. Been taking care of my '04 TL, too. Two of the switches on the Display Panel Control Unit were not lighted up (see what's encircled in yellow on the pix). He sez it's gong to be expensive - the bulb is cheap, but the labor for removal of the Display Panel Control Unit and the Center Console will take an hour. I postponed it until I needed the 105,000 maintenance biggie, last week. Asked him to fix the LED. The car comes back and the mechanic says he replaced the bulb and the whole panel went dark (see the area circled by red). He says he didn't do anything wrong, the bulb was right, so it must be the panel unit. The unit is close to $1,000. I am bent out of shape. The light was off for only two switches, now, after the "repair" they all off.



Could it be that the mechanic is right and the panel was "going," or is it more likely that he shorted something out during removal or replacement of the unit?

What say you?

 

The lights for the HVAC controls on the side are controlled/powered from the 2 green plugs that plug into the back of the LCD display module.

The HVAC board is in the same aluminum housing as the LCD and the controller board for the NAV buttons (although they can be separated and the HVAC buttons and lights will work without the LCD and NAV board connected. I'll post why I know this at a later time)

The bulbs themselves are just a standard bayonet style incandescent bulb.

I would find it odd that all of them would go at the same time, especially since they are separate boards that are tied to each set of buttons. I'd check EVERY fuse in the car and also double check all the connections of the harnesses that plug in to the LCD board assembly and the HVAC harnesses that plug into the LCD assembly as well.

Of course do all this after you make sure the dimmer is not turned down.

 

I haven't taken apart an 04's dash, but when I went to fix a couple lights on our old 03's hvac controls, the snapping back in of the dash caused more lights to go out (so I had to open it up again and just replaced all the bulbs while I was in there). After you check the fuses, I would want to try swapping the new bulbs your mechanic put in with one or two of the ones that went out and see if the other bulbs just went out.

 

Well your mechanic isn't lying to you about the how long it would take. Its a huge pain in the ass to replace those little bulbs, the whole center console basically needs to be removed. DiamondJoeQuimby said it right, first thing i would do is check all the fuses. theyre not all on the same board. Goodluck buddy

 

Any updates on this? I changed some bulbs in mine that were out, and guess what? Now none work just like yours. Alpine will repair unit for $258.00 (if that is what's wrong). I hate to pull it and ship it if the problem is somewhere else.