Using an oven? I've considered it. I've also touched up a lot of solder joints on the board that were suspect, none of them fixed it. I'm hesitant to throw it in the oven because it has so much plastic on it. Wiring connector, stepper motors, a ton of little leds. That stuff would melt long before the solder gets hot enough to flow, wouldn't it? The guide I see says you can cover "heat sensitive components" with foil. Hm.
Is it still getting power? Seems odd that it all dropped out like that at once. Sounds like it could just be a bad trace or solder joint somewhere near the power source. Oven baking it might work but running a decent heat gun over it for a while will do the same thing without all of the melting plastic, just a good bit more effort.
It's an intermittent thing, and it isn't a wiring issue within the car, it's the cluster itself. When I still had the other vic, I put the known-good instrument cluster from that car into this one and it worked without fault. It used to just go out for a minute or two every once in a while, but it's slowly gotten worse to the point where it'll come on for 10 seconds once every couple trips. I've messed with it quite a bit, I've had it out of the car and down to the bare board three times now, and I've flowed every major connection. With only the board plugged into the car, you can get it to come on or go off by flexing it a little. It's obviously a broken trace or a bad solder joint somewhere.
Eh I worded that weird, what I meant was the where the gauge board connects to the car power source, but yeah if flexing fixes it then its definitely a trace or joint, may just be easier to sell it on for parts and get a new one if you cant track it down. Baking its probably a good final option though.
I will admit, the cassette decks skip feature is awesome. Some real German Engineering right there. Also all three of the pop out cupholders have broken, plus they can't fit anything bigger than a soda can. The only alternative is the center armrest cupholder, which is always in the way when I change gears. The temperature up button on the driver side sticks, so you have to wiggle it to make sure it doesn't keep going up. The sunroof squeaks. Part of the rear window gasket fell off. At one point, you could open the trunk when the car was locked, and the alarm wouldn't even go off. (Has since been fixed.) When you fast forward a cassette, the radio turns on. The steering wheel lock only works 10% of the time. The hydraulic cylinder that holds up the hood broke, so I have to use a piece of wood to prop it up. The car beeps if you unbuckle before you turn off the car. But hey, it can skip songs on a cassette.
Holy crap. How does a car fail that much in just under 2 decades? I can only assume it was poorly serviced and/or abused, or simply poorly built? (no offense of course) And about this: This is a wonderful example of the huge problem that is car manufacturers over-complicating things. Why not just use a metal rod that folds out from under the hood like every other car manufacturer, audi? Why a needlessly complex system that you know is going to break?.....oh wait. They know it's going to break. In fact, they made it with the sole purpose of breaking. They didn't make this hydraulic part for your convenience, they made it so they can get extra cash when it breaks, and the owner has to take it back to the dealer to fix it. German cars are guilty of this more than any others, with BMW and Mercedes also being notorious for what is commonly refered to as "planned obsolence". It's the automotive equivalent of negging.
It's not actually hydraulic. It's nitrogen filled and replacements are damn cheap. They're used for the trunks of most cars just fine so why not the hood
My car has gas struts for the hood and they were replaced about a year ago (and for the first time according to the service history). And they weren't too expesive, something like 50-ish euros for the pair (have the receipt somewhere). Idk if these are different to the original ones but these have a "lock" on them which the hood rests on so it doesn't stress the struts too much when the hood is open. The red/orange part is the lock and you push it to release it. Anyway, replaced my wiper blades earlier this week. Even tho they were the cheapest ones, there's a huge difference to the old worn ones.
Well, my car has "a bit" more heavy duty struts than a boot has since the hood is pretty damn big and heavy.
The only reason the boot would have had struts first is because it generally open for about 20 seconds at a time and is used much more often than opening the bonnet with the general population. I would still rather have the metal rod that holds it open, not only will it never fail or have to be replaced, it just seems like a much better system to me as it is extremely simple.
My corsa the strut for holding bonnet open was eternally broken, if you grabbed it to pull it upwards, rather than one end unlocking and it pivoting around the other end, you were walking off with the strut.
Maybe Opel was going for a 2 in 1 approach. Weapon and bonnet holder. Seeing as the Corsa is the same as a Barina. A weapon like that would be great in some areas of Australia. I'm talking about you Elizabeth.
It was my dad's (he still occasionally drives it), but he took pretty good care of it. He didn't baby it or anything, but he definitely cared for it. The Chicago weather probably doesn't help the longevity of the car I'm sure. I forgot exactly what it was, but within one week of my mom's allroad extended 7-year warranty something failed. It was around a $500 repair, so that really sucked.
