Taped Joins In Dashboard Harness??

[JackCisco]

Hi Everyone,

I have a 2011 1.2L 3 cylinder Polo.

I've been tracing back a melted wire in my dashboard harness to replace it and any other damaged wires.

While cutting apart the harness I noticed a large amount of wires that are joined together with what just looks like tape!

There's at least 10-15 spots where this has been done.

Surely this is not factory right??

I've attached some images of this.

I basically need to know if I have a huge amount of bodge to fix or if I can just fix the issue I've been working on and that's it.

[RUM4MO]

The way that that bunch of earths have been joined looks horrible but probably done at factory, that will be a local earth node.

I can't see anyone else being able to make or trust that method of joining wires, which obviously is a normal way of doing that nowadays, I would have expected a plated copper sleeve/ferrule to have been used but that way must work fine.

[amer6R]

I have seen similar in other VW cars. Its VW thing, what did you expect. There are better ways, buts savings are savings. And they get offended when i say vw is ....

[JackCisco]

Thanks for the input. I wasn't sure because the headlights stay on when the light switch is off, so thought perhaps someone had been in this location before to "fix" things.

Glad to know that I haven't got a massive mess to fix now, just a medium sized mess!

[SimonPoole]

The headlights stay on when the switch is off because of the daytime running lights.
Do they go off when you turn the side lights on?
If so this is normal.

[wolfie]

Thanks for the input. I wasn't sure because the headlights stay on when the light switch is off, so thought perhaps someone had been in this location before to "fix" things.

Glad to know that I haven't got a massive mess to fix now, just a medium sized mess!

Aye, mine is also a 2011 car, at that point in time the headlamps started being used as the "DRL's" so car runs on dipped beam all the time. Switching to side-lights/parking lights turns main beam off. Then if you switch to headlamps they obviously switch back on again. If you notice when running in DRL the instrument cluster doesn't illuminate, but when you switch to headlamps it does, even though headlamps are on on both cases. Hope that helps just incase you're chasing a feature and not a fault..

[JackCisco]

Thanks for the input. I wasn't sure because the headlights stay on when the light switch is off, so thought perhaps someone had been in this location before to "fix" things.

Glad to know that I haven't got a massive mess to fix now, just a medium sized mess!

Aye, mine is also a 2011 car, at that point in time the headlamps started being used as the "DRL's" so car runs on dipped beam all the time. Switching to side-lights/parking lights turns main beam off. Then if you switch to headlamps they obviously switch back on again. If you notice when running in DRL the instrument cluster doesn't illuminate, but when you switch to headlamps it does, even though headlamps are on on both cases. Hope that helps just incase you're chasing a feature and not a fault..

Thanks for the info. The issue that I'm solving is that the dash cluster doesn't light when you turn the headlight switch to on. It failed MOT for that, which I think is absolutely stupid because I can still tell what speed I'm doing in the dark because of the speed readout on the screen in the middle.. yet the test centre was adamant the speedo dial must be illuminated

[wolfie]

Thanks for the info. The issue that I'm solving is that the dash cluster doesn't light when you turn the headlight switch to on. It failed MOT for that, which I think is absolutely stupid because I can still tell what speed I'm doing in the dark because of the speed readout on the screen in the middle.. yet the test centre was adamant the speedo dial must be illuminated

I'm pretty sure the dash has an optical sensor in it, so it doesn't illuminate in DRL mode if it's dark.

Headlights on (dash illuminates as do all the interior controls)
Sidelights on (dash illuminates as do all the interior controls)
Switched to DRL. ( Controls and instruments do not illuminate. But needles do, If it's dark!) I think the idea is if you look at the instruments and you are in DRL mode Headlights on you only see the needles. It sort of reminds you to actually switch your lights on, because you don't see the legends lit up.

As I say I think that's how it's supposed to work. I will check it in the morning for you if you wish. (It's tipping it down at the moment) I only twigged the optical sensor because I left a duster on the dash and noticed the dash change.

[JackCisco]

Thanks for the info. The issue that I'm solving is that the dash cluster doesn't light when you turn the headlight switch to on. It failed MOT for that, which I think is absolutely stupid because I can still tell what speed I'm doing in the dark because of the speed readout on the screen in the middle.. yet the test centre was adamant the speedo dial must be illuminated

I'm pretty sure the dash has an optical sensor in it, so it doesn't illuminate in DRL mode if it's dark.

Headlights on (dash illuminates as do all the interior controls)
Sidelights on (dash illuminates as do all the interior controls)
Switched to DRL. ( Controls and instruments do not illuminate. But needles do, If it's dark!) I think the idea is if you look at the instruments and you are in DRL mode Headlights on you only see the needles. It sort of reminds you to actually switch your lights on, because you don't see the legends lit up.

As I say I think that's how it's supposed to work. I will check it in the morning for you if you wish. (It's tipping it down at the moment) I only twigged the optical sensor because I left a duster on the dash and noticed the dash change.

Yep you nailed it on the head.

My guess is that something caused a short and the dial next to the headlight aim adjuster, which controls the brightness of the console lights, burned out. I had that little dial out first and the micro chip on it was so hot it would burn my finger if I touched it for a split second.

I'm going to replace the melted wires, the dimmer and the light switch and fingers crossed that does the trick!

Internal short on the microchip > melted wires > heat > burns out?? Who knows. Just glad that's all that happened

I've been driving it like this for 3 years, no idea why the same MOT place decided to pick up on it now. Maybe it's a good thing I'm sorting it out as it could have gotten worse? But if it hasn't gotten worse already then maybe it wouldn't ever?