New to A4 - let the problems begin

[ubaldo]

Hi all,

I finally "upgraded" to a 2002 A4 Avant after owning a 1989 passat estate for 8 years (spending winter in the garage unitl i can replace the fuel line) so kind of out of my confort zone.

The latest issue is the display in the middle of the dashboard (small lcd screen) is completely off. A quick look at the fuse box did not reveal anything and all other electrical parts in the car seem ok. Is there something else i should check before i take the dash out to see if the display is dead?

One quick note is this happened after the rear brake and parking lights went and had to be replaced, the warning message was displayed on the screen so after work i got some bulbs from halfords and sorted them. Next morning the display did not turn on.

Any suggestion is much appreciated

[soobusdriver]

Hi Ubaldo,

Just a quick idea, the wiper stalk behind the steering wheel has a small reset button on the bottom (opposite side of the intermittent speed selector) push this once and you should see the middle screen display all the info for Trip 1 along with radio and any other messages, push it again and it'll display Trip 2, once more and the whole screen will be off.

Hope it's just this simple for you.

Cheers

Andy

[ubaldo]

Hi Andy,

Thanks for the suggestion, i had already checked various combinations of pressing the reset button but nothing the screen stays off

[ubaldo]

Well i've taken the dash out in the end (much easier than on the passat) and does not look to be any evident damage. I've come across this site on this forum http://www.pixelfix.net/eng/audi-vw-seat.html so ended up ordering the sge 2685 transformer as that cluster is exactly the same as mine and the problem described seem to fit. plus £15 including shipping is much better than replacing the whole lcd to begin with

[ubaldo]

Well the transformer did not go anywhere so I bought a second hand cluster from the bay and surprise surprise the simple swap was a no go.
Any idea where I can find a replacement LCD for a 8E0920 980Hx cluster?

[Scott K]

There's a company called cartronix which repair them. Never used myself but maybe someone can recommend them?

[ubaldo]

thank you Scott, i had a look but £150 sounds a bit too much just to get a lcd screen working. I noticed a guide last night (don't know if it's on this forum) to sort of hack the new dash and reprogram the immo so it recognises the keys and also match the odometer. I'm tempted to try it

[rhencullen1989]

Hi, you could try BBA Reman, he should sort it.