So I just drove home, parked, pushed the headlight **** in and turned off the ignition. But my parking lights are still on. The **** felt a little "funny" when I pushed it in. Turns out it (partially) fell apart! It was all loose and dangling. I could not manage to make the parking lights go off in several attempts at pushing/pulling/twisting things. The **** can still be twisted to dim the dash lights. At one point I had the headlights come back on. Since it's dark out, I just disconnected the battery and will take a better look tomorrow. I found no real help with this searching the forum. If I can't manage a "fix" tomorrow I'd prefer to pull the fuses on the lights (instead of continually disc'g the battery) but my shop LOST my manual. This will be a temporary fix for sure.

Sooo ... maybe someone can help with 2-3 things: (1) advice on how to fix the switch (2) advice on where a replacement switch can be found and (3) a guide to where the fuse controlling the lights can be found on this 1994 vehicle!

Thanks!!!!

 

1) Pull the dash and replace the switch

2) Advance Auto Parts / Autozone / O'Reilly's / etc

3) This is from a 94 Explorer, but should be fairly similar I'd assume.

 

Thanks for the response. The guy at Advance Auto gave me some hints about trying to repair it myself but I don't think they sold replacement units there. So I pulled the dash panel away - but not completely off. The radio was troublesome. I removed the entire assembly. I found that the plastic, donut-shaped fastener that screws into the switch from the outside (the shaft of the pull-**** runs thru it) had snapped. Part of the threaded shaft was still in the unit. I was able to back it out using a screwdriver. I super-glued the pieces together yesterday afternoon and will be putting it all back together later today. The unit is relatively heavy and this puts stress right where I made the repair so I am considering ways to support the unit somehow to take the pressure off. I expect I'll need to be gentle when pulling/pushing the **** from here on!

 

OK .. so the "glue it" repair did not work. I opted to drill 2 holes thru the metal plate that covers the unit (the ****'s shaft passes thru it) and continuing those holes thru the "face" of the switch. I had to be careful to avoid striking the rheostat with the drill bit and to use short screws to avoid interfering with the rotation of it. If I paint the heads of the screws it will hardly be noticed. Very sturdy now and that's all I care about.

Meantime, the radio doesn't work! I must have loosened a wire while trying to pull the dash cover off. It still lights up and shows the time but won't react when I push the On/Off button. Will deal with this problem this w/e.