So I read a thread that described installing some fluorescent lights in the car, and I thought to myself, "hey, I can do that and it's cheap!" I bought a computer tower 12-inch 12-volt blue fluorescent light (FL) for $13 online, unhooked the OEM trunk light, spliced the wires, put the FL's wires onto the leads... and got nothing. Turns out I blew a fuse! So I thought, no problem, there must be a back up. Sure enough I found the blown intrument lights fuse, took the nearby "back up" fuse and put it in place. The light worked, everything is awesome... until I noticed other things don't work anymore.

The radio wanted the code -- put that in and it works.
The navigation system (both screen and drive) won't work.
The keyless alarm won't work (remote).
The door locks won't work.
The dome lights don't come up when I open the doors (but they do when I put the keys in).

Who knows what else doesn't work. The manual says the back up fuse is actually the fuse for the reverse lights, yet that works!! I must have taken a different fuse...

So... I'm getting a new 10A fuse tomorrow and see if everything goes back to normal. If it does not, I'm so screwed! I can take the light off (that's easy), but I have an amp and I'm sure the dealer will go up and down over how the warranty doesn't cover the audio installation. Nevermind it's not the cause. And I can't take that off easily.

Darn.

 

Sorry to hear that. I just replaced the Neons that I had with the same computer neons listed on that thread. Everything works great. But they are kind of whitish blue, haven't decided if I am going to keep them.

You might of pulled out the wrong fuse. But once you replace it you should be back to where you were.


BTW, their are spare fuses in the fuse box under the hood.

 

I replaced the fuse and everything works great. I just needed my navigation alarm code.

The blue light I got is also kind of white, but it's very bright and it looks really neat. I'll post some pics later this week in a new thread.

Thanks for writing!

 

Pics would be cool. And yeah, the lights from SVC are white with a blueish tint. But they do light up the trunk pretty well.

 

the backup fuse is for the radio back up or "memory" not backup lights.

 

I didn't even notice that he said "back up".