Headlights on...panels dim??

[Veik]

New owner, 03P5.

When I turn on the headlights, my orange backlighting really dims, to the point where its hard to see the ODO.

Is that normal or is the battery needs replacement?

 

[Hank3]

The Mazdaspeed Protege and Protege5 clusters are known to be pretty dim when you flip the headlights on. Are your speedo and tach dim also? One of the first things I did when I bought my P5 last year was change out the cluster bulbs for new ones. The original bulbs were blackened (once you take off the orange rubber covers on them) and I noticed a difference with the new bulbs in - definitely brighter, but don't expect electroluminiscent bright . As far as the ODO, if it's not the battery, then I'm afraid you'll have to deal with it being on the dim side.

 

[Veik]

The Mazdaspeed Protege and Protege5 clusters are known to be pretty dim when you flip the headlights on. Are your speedo and tach dim also? One of the first things I did when I bought my P5 last year was change out the cluster bulbs for new ones. The original bulbs were blackened (once you take off the orange rubber covers on them) and I noticed a difference with the new bulbs in - definitely brighter, but don't expect electroluminiscent bright . As far as the ODO, if it's not the battery, then I'm afraid you'll have to deal with it being on the dim side.

Its not a problem, just didnt know if it was related to a voltage drop or something...

 

[mattomatic]

Sorry to thread jack< but i have a similar problem except half my tac dims, how hard was it to take out the cluster?

 

[azuelke]

^ Very easy... take the srews out of the surround (on top) and take the surround off. The cluster is then held in by 3? screws.