Buick - Regal :: Lights On The Instrument Panel Go Out - Plastic Burning Smell
Sep 15, 2014
1991 Buick Regal. I'm driving at night a few days ago and all of a sudden the lights on the instrument panel go out. The headlights are still on and the radio is still playing.
So I click the headlights on and off and the instrument panel lights come back on. The next night this happens again. This time I just give the headlight switch a little jiggle and they come back on. Tonight they go out again, jiggle the switch and they come back on. They go right back out. Jiggle the switch again and they're on.
I drive for another five minutes and now I smell plastic burning; it's the typical electrical/wire short smell. I turned the interior lights on and there was no visible smoke.
I'm going to try and pull the dash tomorrow and see what's going on in there, but they want $400 for an OEM replacement switch! I found some used ones online, but I'd have to get them mailed from a junk yard for about $50 bucks.
So I'm wondering, is there a easy/cheap way to rig a headlight switch in the interim so I don't have a fire in this thing? I don't understand why a headlight switch has so many prongs on the connector.
The only caveat is that the guy who had this car before me rigged the ignition through the headlights (I was told as some kind of security feature?) so that the car will not crank unless the headlights are on. Maybe/hopefully some shoddy wiring on that is just causing an arc.
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1999 Buick Regal. Instrument panel lights will not come on when we turn on the headlights. The dimmer knob is turned correctly. I've checked all the appropriate fuses (I think). The radio display is also affected. The time display almost completely dims out. This even happens when the headlights come on automatically at dusk.
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Last night I was driving in my 2003 jetta on the intersate at 65mph with the cruise control on. As I came into a turn I had to tap the brakes. As soon as I did the check engine light came on. The car was doing fine so I drove home from school. Today I drove the car to work which is a five minute drive, and back with no problem. I later went to grab lunch and bring it home and then I noticed the check engine light started flashing. I then felt the engine start to stutter, as if it was misfiring. We had the windshield defrost when we started to smell a rotten egg smell. Luckily we were pulling into our drive when we smelled the odor. I immediately turned off the car and got out. I couldn't smell the rotten egg smell, but I did smell burning plastic. I didn't see any smoke and could not pinpoint the cause of the smell.
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Greetings from the desert of the SW. I have a 1995 Buick Regal I inherited from my Mom when she passed away several years ago. It had low mileage at the time so when things started going wrong, I replaced things like a rusted gas tank, head gasket, thermostat, and belts and the car got me from the Midwest to the Southwest. It now has 105K miles and I've started to smell antifreeze when I drive. The temperature gauge needle will move from the middle line towards hot but never all the way to hot when the car is idling.
As soon as I get moving again, the temperature indicator moves back down to the middle line of the gauge. The anti-freeze level in the 'jug' is fine and the level in the radiator is ok too. I'm wondering if there might be a problem with the thermostat? Unfortunately I live in an area where there aren't any "real" car mechanic garages to take it to for a check up. I'm planning a trip to Phoenix in a couple of weeks which is 5 hrs away. Since antifreeze isn't pouring out of somewhere, I'm going to drive it and hope I make it there and back again.
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I own a 2000 Buick Regal, and have recently come across a gasoline smell while driving. While taking a longer drive, I realized that it would heavily smell like gasoline when I would go from park or from a stop. It really makes me nervous to drive my car not knowing what could be causing this problem. What is going on?
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I own a 1996 Buick Regal with 132k miles on it, 3.1L six cylinder. The other day I was doing some general maintenance and noticed that the exhaust smelled like sulfur (rotten eggs). Now, I am loosely familiar with the causes of such a thing but not well enough to diagnose it properly the first time. The car has been idling rough since I got it (almost a year ago now), I have a feeling that it could be the O2 sensor causing the rough idle and the sulfur smell but I am not completely sure. I should have one of those fancy three-part injector cleaners done?
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Can a piece inside the HID be replaced. I noticed that my bulb was coming loose because every now and then the light would stop working.
I'd open the hood tighten it and all would be good for weeks sometimes months. Today it stopped and I opened it and this time it had a burning plastic smell.
Can this piece be replaced?
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After driving about 60kms yesterday for the first time and driving pretty cautiously to break the car in i noticed a pretty strong burning plastic like smell in our garage.
This is only my 3rd brand new car and i don't remember the other 2 having this smell..
does hyundai coat their new cars with Cosmoline? or another protective coating that burns off and takes a bit to go away?
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My car smells like some plastic part is burning inside. The heat works just fine but for some reason i am getting this horrible smell. How to get to air filter of the fan.
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There’s a problem with my climate-control system. When I turn the fan on, there is no air blowing through the outlets on the instrument-panel. (There is air blowing thru the 2 vents immediately above the floor, and some air blowing at the base of the windshield). This problem exists regardless of what speed I turn the fan on, and regardless of which climate-control setting I choose (or whether I turn on the A/C).
This problem WAS occurring on an intermittent basis, and seemed to develop in RESPONSE TO my turning the knob to “defrost.” Now, however, the problem seems to be permanent. I wonder whether the basic problem is with the round knob that controls the various climate-control settings, as this knob seems somewhat hard to turn.
I have a 2004 Buick Century sedan, with automatic transmission (4speed) w/overdrive, V-6 engine 3.1 L.
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I have a 2007 Sonata V6 with 198,000km (123,000 miles) and when I was driving yesterday I smelt a burning smell like burning rubber or plastic. The smell seemed to go away after a while and I was wondering what could have caused it?
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Where do I start. I have a 2001 Nissan Sentra. 128,000 miles. In Aug. of last year, the engine detonated, so I had it replaced along with other parts. Shortly after that, I noticed a burning plastic smell coming from the car after driving it for a while. I confirmed that that the smell wasn't coming from a plastic bag. Fast forward to Dec 2011, my check engine light comes on. I go to Autozone, have the code read; it's the dreaded 420 code. I go to have it checked out, was told my cat went bad and probably because of the old engine and that the smell is probably coming from that.
The check engine light went off on Christmas day. Fast forward to last month, the light comes on again and I pony up the cash to have the cat replaced since inspection is coming up in June. Now, I had an engine diagnostic run right before I got the cat replaced and it came up fine. The cat was replaced on 4/20. Everything seemed fine. The burning plastic smell went a way, but lo and behold, it came back this week. I don't know what to do. I did a little search on the net and it seems that burning plastic smell indicates there is something going on with engine and possible misfire.
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After battling the general nitwit public earlier. I was on my way home and as I neared my house, a party bus was blocking the road. Well, I got angry, shifted to reverse, revved the engine while letting out the clutch to back up and take a different route. Then this horrible burning electric/plastic smell inundated the inside of my R. I knew I rode that clutch while backing up. My question is did I do noticeable damage my clutch, or is it one of those: it'll be fine just don't do it again thing?
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I have a 2001 buick regal with the odometer lights out. How do I fix this? Do I have to take the dash off to get to the light?
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My Regal has no dash lights, I checked the 7.5 amp fuse inside car and it is good.
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My running lights aren't working. My father (who has been working on cars since the mid 1960's and now fiddles with small farm equipment too)- checked every single fuse - on the passenger side panel, and both right and left panels under the hood. All fuses were good. A couple of years ago I had a problem with the brake lights (not the third one) not working and it turned out it was in the turn signal lever. We had tried the fuses, wires, etc. and couldn't figure it out. So I'm thinking that the running lights are something weird like that too. Especially since I can't drive at night without any running lights.
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I recently worked with a friend get a '95 regal custom 3.1 with 178k miles and the only issue I cant figure out on my own is that the back up lights never come on when either shifting into reverse or through it. I've checked all of the fuses and replaced the bulbs and still not even a flicker.
I have researched online a bit and my only idea is it could be the back-up light switch/neutral position switch.. Would that be an accurate guess? And if so where at on the vehicle would that switch be located?
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I own a 2001 Buick Century Limited that has 208k miles on it. A couple days ago I started the car up at a friends house and noticed that it had a loud rough idle and that the check engine light came on. When I drove the car home, the CEL would flash when I accelerated and I could smell something burning. When I released the gas pedal and coasted, the flashing CEL would return back to a solid state but I could still smell the burning. When I would accelerate, the CEL would start to flash again. Whenever I was stopped at a stop sign, the flashing CEL would again be solid and there would be a loud rough idle along with the same burning smell. Am I looking at an engine replacement or an easy fix? One problem or could it be multiple problems?
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Turn signal lights not working on a 1995 Buick Regal. I have replaced fuse & flasher but still didn't solve problem.
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Recently purchased a CPO 2009 F250SD 6.4L. Happy with the truck overall but this AM I noticed a slight burning plastic smell so I opened the hood and looked around closely. Didn't really find the culprit(I don't think) but noticed that the engine compartment heat shield/barrier appears to be falling down above and behind the turbos (pictures linked below). How big a deal is this? Would it be covered under the CPO warranty? It almost seems like a safety issue. I also wonder if the insulation material, now exposed without the metal reflector material, is what is causing the smell....
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This has bothered me a while. I turn the instrument lights to max brightness, but they are very dim. I can see them, but they are all very dim.
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