Thread: HUD Fixed for Free.. wierd

Well, My HUD was intermitantly coming on, fading away, then disapearing, only to reappear when i turned right, or left, or hit a bump. It seemed to be extremely bright when i turned on the car.

So i figured "hey it COULD be the sun sensor". WRONG! After a FULL dis-assembly, and cleaning of the unit, The only noticible damage was on the actual LCD itself, Where the #1 pin of the ribbon cable was going in the unit, im assuming is power, there was a small "size of a rice pellow" burn mark on the LCD directly where the cable was entering the sealed LCD. I figure this could be the issue.

I check all of the circuit boards, and see no burn marks anywhere. I check the solder of the photo sensor, and it is practically brand new, FULL solder the entire way around the pins, So i say well, i guess that burn in the LCD is a short, that is causing it to heat up, gain resistance, and fade away.

So i re-assemble everything, install all the little tiny black plastic clips, and re-insert the 20 pin ribbon cable, clean the mirror, clean the plastic cover, screw it all back together, then FINALLY toss it in the car.

Crank her up, and Suprise, the HUD works perfectly.

I did nothing, literally NOTHING except for clean off a little dust from the mirror/plastic, and replug everything back in.

Now it stays nice and bright, day or night, and never fades.

Total cost for this repair - 1 hour of labor, whilst slacking ALOT.

I was so worried i would have to end up purchasing another HUD unit.

100$ SAVED

What if the information center quit working?

Not the bulb, now I notice that the door adjar or key in ignition bell is not working. I pulled the fuse, it was fine, so I put it back in and the bell started dinging. Now everything is functioning again. Cost? $0.00

Cracked cold solder joints could be the issue for a flickering HUD, or center display.

My Vibe radio had half the display flickering. Took it apart, hit all the solder joints with my iron and it is fixed. My Corvette, if it had ACC, also has the same thing happen to the units as it gets older.

I learned about cracked cold solder joints from working on my pinball machines. Most of these joints are large enough to see the crack, but not always. Over years of heat and cold down cycles, these joints crack, causing issues like these. A sometimes on, sometimes off, problem shows up, like a flickering HUD. Simply hitting each joint with a solder iron, reflows the solder and melts the crack back.

For auto repair, you must take the units apart and get to the printed circuit boards to do this though.

Photo diode.

Originally Posted by KawaFord

Mine doesn't flicker, it fades slowly in and out.

Yeah, does not matter. When electronics act up, the joints need to be checked before throwing parts at it.

my hud's doing the same thing, only like 2 nights out of the month but its kinda annoying but not enough for me to try and diagnose the problem by myself, i might just give it a quick lookover tho now thanks