I don't have every year Explorer wiring manual but it looks like the early and late connectors have a different pinout. Is the display green or blue?

 

Aye, I remember you saying something about that Bob, thanks for the info. I'm not too worried about the dimmer atm, it works great otherwise. As I recall when I hooked up that wire, it did the opposite instead of making it brighter it made it dimmer lol. Maybe I did something wrong, dunno. I might try an Explorer dimmer sometime in the future though, I if do I may give you a holler.

Thanks!

 

Green

 

OK, green is the late style. Trace the black/light blue from the pigtail into the console. According to the info I have, it should change to a white wire, not black.

 

Of course I wanted one with a green display so everything would match...hah now I got myself into this.

I'm at work right now and my truck is at home. If it does this then what do I do?

 

My 2003 did that with the late (green) console. I asked John about it and he said that the dimming for his early (blue) console worked fine in his 2002 Ranger. I left it like that for a couple of years but fixed it when I had my dash apart for the V8 and trip computer changes.

 

Either get a late pigtail (98~01 Ex?) to match the late console or repin what you have.

 

I will repin it. I will take a picture of the inside and post it up.

Thanks for all your help so far!

 

Yes, I have a green display from I believe a '98 Explorer. Thanks for the info Bob.

 

It does change to a white wire and t's off

Here are some pictures:






Let me know if you need some more.

 

Is this how it is connected?

 

I can't remember, but are the screws in the dome light different lengths, don't they have to go in the same hole they came out of?

I do remember that if I screwed in my dome light too tight it would cause it to stay on ALL the time. So I backed out the screws a little and it worked fine. I think it was the screw on the drivers side, closest to the wind sheild that was giving me problems. I also have an 03 with the green display and wired just like Bob said and everything worked great, so I figured that I would throw one more thing you can check that gave me a hic-up.

 

No I put down the wrong thing, it is the black blue. When I wrote that I was trying to go off memory and I stayed up late working on it.

I wired it up exactly what you put down. Since all the other wire colors matched I thought the Red Black was the dimmer light connection.

 

UPDATE!!!!!

Okay so Bob you are going to kill me...I hooked up everything exactly as it was supposed to but I didn't realize the map lights doubled as the dome light. Well you guessed it one of the map lights didn't work and so when I pressed the button I figured it was off plus they light up on the opposite side. So it is working perfectly. The dimmer doesn't work but that doesn't bother me because I have tinted windows and it dims when you turn the headlamps on, which I think would actually be correct.

Anyways I got both lamps working and everything is a go.

Thanks for all the help guys. Sometimes you shouldn't work on your truck when it's late at night.

And wow is it bright in the cab now.

 

Cool, it works. With a late console in there, the dimming may not work 100% correctly unless you convert to an Ex dimmer module. When I was using the factory Ranger module, the display used to jump to full bright when the wheel was cranked to full dim.

 

Yes why does it do that? The wiring in the explorers is kind of different...My friend had a fully loaded explorer and the mirror had a switch that he could turn his headlamps off while he was going down the road. I never read the book on it but he always thought that was really odd.








and one of my sexy gauges

 

Looks great Zach, nice work!

 

Glad it's working! Love the thumbs up pic, lol

 

I don't know but I have a theory. The voltage level from the Ranger dimmer may drop to such a low value that the console sees it as a 'headlights off' situation. When it thinks the headlights are off, the console reverts to the full bright daytime display. The Explorer dimmer module is a fancier dual output device which is, of course, designed to work with all of the Ex accessories.



That is the Autolamps mirror that turns the headlights on and off automatically based on ambient light. When you turn it off at the mirror switch, it reverts to control by the main headlamp switch.

 

If I didn't have the red wire attached would the OHC still dim? I like the fact it isn't as bright at night.

Ah, that makes sense.

 

I believe that it would not dim without the red/black input. Easy enough to check out.

 

[QUOTE=rwenzing;987111]I don't know but I have a theory. The voltage level from the Ranger dimmer may drop to such a low value that the console sees it as a 'headlights off' situation. When it thinks the headlights are off, the console reverts to the full bright daytime display. The Explorer dimmer module is a fancier dual output device which is, of course, designed to work with all of the Ex accessories.


I believe your theory is correct, Bob. Based on my limited auto electrical knowledge and what I have seen with various switches and such, I believe its the low voltage level present in the Ranger dimmer. Since the Explorer has often much more elec. accessories, I can see how the fancier Explorer dimmer would be more functional. I've wondered about this myself, thanks for stating this much more clearly!

And yes, at the risk of overstating the obvious, w/o the red/blk wire connected the display stays the same brightness (at least in my truck, lol).

Thanks again for the info Bob!

 

[QUOTE=Rangerguy;987536]Oh I like it dimming and it looks fancy. lol