Dimmer and Gauges

**PhyscoDboy** · 08-08-2009, 04:00 AM

So Im having an issue.

My kik fuse panel doesnt seem to follow the scheme on the sticker whatsoever...

the sticker says that fuse#15 is my left tail light and that 14 is the right taillight and licence plate lights..

My voltmeter shows nothing on fuse 15.. Nothing.
14 works just fine but when i pull it I lose my dash lights as well.
the sticker says nothing about the dash.

This all started because im wiring in some gauges and I cant find the right dimmer wire. Every wire I test for the dimmer loses voltage when I turn the brightness up and gains it when I turn it down(which i guess represents load)

Next is the air/ratio guage, when I turn the ignition or the engine on it starts at lean and goes up to rich and stays at max rich. Its grounded on the block and everything, maybe i just have the wrong o2 hooked up or its bad.

Thanks for the help!

**LX-incredible** · 08-08-2009, 08:59 AM

My taillights/dash lights are wired the same way. The dimmer controls the negative illuminition wire, positive should recieve battery voltage at all times.

**ohfoSHO?** · 08-08-2009, 10:18 AM

^^ this guy knows what hes talking about, he has the sweetest guages i've ever seen!!!!

**lostforawhile** · 08-08-2009, 11:57 AM

anything controlled by the dimmer is controlled by ground, one wire to the lamp will be hot whenever the switch is on, the other goes to the dimmer circuit. be careful not to wire it wrong because you can fry the box easy, lamp gets constant voltage with a variable ground. a common mistake is soemone hooking up a radio and hooking the power antenna wire to the ilumination wire in the factory harness, will fry the box, my diagrams show some of the radios had a dimmer circuit wire in the harness and some had a constant 12 volt

**PhyscoDboy** · 08-09-2009, 11:56 AM

Ha!! For whatever reason I just completely overlooked the possibility of a fading ground, lol!

On aftermarket stereos its usually

Red is positive
yellow is constant
pwr. ant. is solid blue
rmt. is blue and white
illuminater is orange
and dimmer is orange and white...

(I think)

So thats figured out.. red/black wire...

What about the o2 reading max rich? Bad o2? Or maybe 300k and im really runnin rich? any ideas or should I just guess and check??