99 Buick Regal Digital Odometer and Gear Light Comes and Goes

[tbeattie83]

I just wanted to say thank you first and foremost for any help or suggestions to take the time to provide!

So here’s my question for you,

I have 1999 Buick Regal LS 3.8

The digital odometer and gear display seems mostly out but then again last night it was barely lit enough for me to see,

I think a similar question was answered before for someone else but I’m also having 3 other issues,

The fuel Gauge wavers all over the place and unless I completely fill it up for the most part that I can tell when it gets to the half empty starts wavering all over again.


The other question is I knew the radiator was shot, completely replaced that, the water pump and the thermostat. The Car no longer over heats but the temperature gauge will go from being at a normal reading and then will occasionally (or so I think) rise way up almost too the red and then the system will cool itself again...... and after last night I started seeing the low coolant light come on but only for about 30 seconds at a time and only twice.

And lastly the digital climate display is out as well, and I dont remember it as always being out before I had to remove the radiator.

Could this just all be a problem with the resistors your related post was talking about?

Could it be the accessory relay? AM I just FUBAR?

Again thank you for any help provided!

 

[rqjoe]

odometer lights on and off or just out completely is the 4 resistors on the back of the IP. low coolant light could be you actually have low coolant or a sludged up sensor (drain some coolant, remove sensor and clean with Q-tip.) fuel guage not sure but most common is the sender unit/pump unit in the tank. climate display not lighting has nothing to do with the radiator; outside temp sensor is in front of radiator and this feeds that part of the display, that is the closest relation there. wild swings on coolant guage indicates bad thermostat; slowly creeping upwards temp could be low coolant as well as bad t-stat.

 

[tbeattie83]

I wanted to say thank you very much for replying to me that really means a lot when someone takes the time to help a stranger....so Thank you very much, as to your response I am going to try the Q tip to the sensor thing but where is this sensor located? also I believe you are right about the resistors....there seems to be some electrical problems in general with the car.....Also even though I replaced the whole radiator, the thermostat and the water pump.... could it be possible that I just got a bad new thermostat and perhaps I should try replacing that again since it’s a pretty inexpensive part if the Q tip to the sensor doesn't work?

Also any comments on the accessory relay like I had asked before? Could that be something that is causing all my electrical haywire problems?

Thanks again
Travis Beattie
619-600-9590

 

[Gam3p0t]

Another possibility seeing as you just replaced the water pump and you are getting a low coolant light (sometimes but not constantly) is that you could have a pressure crack in the elbows coming from the water pump. There's an elbow on the top (or front side) of the pump that could be leaking near the intake which is pretty easy to spot or it could be the return feed pipe on the bottom (or back side) of the water pump these are harder to tell because you can't really see the leaks.

These two elbows are just black plastic with two O rings (orange and purple are the two common colors I've seen) and are pretty easy to fix but can be more painful in models with lots of cross braces. Hope this helps