Buick-Swagg3nz
New member
- Joined
- Jan 8, 2026
- Messages
- 3
- Reaction score
- 0
- Points
- 1
- Location
- Oregon
- Buick Ownership
- 1992 Park Avenue
Hey all, I am the proud new owner of a 92' Park Avenue with 151k miles. My car was garage kept its whole life and is in pristine mechanical shape, but after buying and living with it for a week I've noticed several electrical issues that I can't ignore. If anyone could provide any insight whatsoever, I would be incredibly grateful.
For some reason my interior dashboard lights don't work at night when the headlights are on. At night my entire dashboard and instrument cluster is dead, until about 20-40 minutes of driving, in which they start working again. The gauge cluster is incredibly dim, though. I assume this might be something to do with panel light brightness controls as my car is equipped with the slider, but changing it does nothing. The affected lights are the gauges, stereo, thermometer screen, and climate control button illumination. They all function normally during the day with the lights off, but not at night as stated. Turning off the lights at night will restore the clock and thermometer screen, leading me to believe this is likely connected to the dimming functionality.
A couple additional anomalies are that the intermittent wipers don't work; The wipers just go at two speeds essentially. The wipers also won't shut off when I disable them, they will remain on for 5-20 minutes until finally returning to their off position. Additionally the HVAC blend door will also take an extended amount of time to change between defog and interior dashboard vents. The motor isn't bad since it will change, just not with any kind of consistency. I find it very odd that multiple systems of the car seem to exhibit similar delay patterns.
Has anybody had similar electrical issues such as this? I would like to try figuring out what the problem is before taking it to an electrical specialist to avoid running up diagnostic costs. The car is in very sound condition other than this as it was garage kept its entire life. Any insight would be greatly appreciated.
For some reason my interior dashboard lights don't work at night when the headlights are on. At night my entire dashboard and instrument cluster is dead, until about 20-40 minutes of driving, in which they start working again. The gauge cluster is incredibly dim, though. I assume this might be something to do with panel light brightness controls as my car is equipped with the slider, but changing it does nothing. The affected lights are the gauges, stereo, thermometer screen, and climate control button illumination. They all function normally during the day with the lights off, but not at night as stated. Turning off the lights at night will restore the clock and thermometer screen, leading me to believe this is likely connected to the dimming functionality.
A couple additional anomalies are that the intermittent wipers don't work; The wipers just go at two speeds essentially. The wipers also won't shut off when I disable them, they will remain on for 5-20 minutes until finally returning to their off position. Additionally the HVAC blend door will also take an extended amount of time to change between defog and interior dashboard vents. The motor isn't bad since it will change, just not with any kind of consistency. I find it very odd that multiple systems of the car seem to exhibit similar delay patterns.
Has anybody had similar electrical issues such as this? I would like to try figuring out what the problem is before taking it to an electrical specialist to avoid running up diagnostic costs. The car is in very sound condition other than this as it was garage kept its entire life. Any insight would be greatly appreciated.
