328 Rheostat / Dimmer: ~ 1.2V loss. Bypass?

Hi guys,

I bypassed the dimmer on my old 308, since the whole setup there was just scary and it was a prudent thing to do. The downside is, you don't get to dim your instrument lights; the upside is that they were always brighter than they were.

On the 328, everything is a bit neater, but there is still a voltage loss in the resistor/rheostat that controls the instrument lights.

Bypassing this is very easy and very reversible--just a cut and and two insulated spade connectors. The wiring itself is very straightforward at this switch.

Has anyone else bypassed the dimmer switch on their 328? Has anyone else actually found the lights to bright, and hence needed to be dimmed a bit at night?

Other thoughts / considerations?

--Mike

 

Wanted to post the numbers... With the ignition off, and parking lights on, I got 11.7V input to the Rheostat (328 white wire), and 10.5V output from the Rheostat (yellow wire) when the rheostat was fully opened. So there is a voltage drop. Bypassing it will make the instrument lights brighter, my expectation is noticeably so.

While I'm in there, it will be easy to draw the parking-lights controlled instrument light switched voltage for the new voltmeter...

 

Bypassed it without issue. Instrument lights are good and bright, but not too bright. This combined with the bulb upgrade in the speedo and tach, and everything is satisfactory.

--Mike

 

Thanks Dave! As far as I'm concerned, if you and I both do the same thing, arrived at independently, then we have an "expert consensus"!