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So my maintenance required light is on. I know, I know, there's a billion threads on this AND a sticky, but this I think this situation is a little different...

Long story short, the light is on and the trip button doesn't work anymore. I mean, it doesn't work at all. I took apart the cluster all the way down to the circuit board and tried all sorts of ways to press the button (and the thing that the button presses) and reset it, but it just doesn't register that I'm pressing it.

I also thought I could take out whatever lightbulb lights up the "maintenance req'd" light (possible permanent fix!), but there isn't a bulb specific to that light. It isn't like the turn signals where you can pop out a light bulb--it's more like the seatbelt light in which there's something on the circuit board that lights up. I dunno, that's the one thing I didn't wanna dissect in the Auto Zone parking lot. It didn't seem like it was meant to be taken apart.

I also tried disconnecting the battery for a good 15 minutes to see if it would reset. No luck.

I then tried seeing if there was a fuse specific to this stupid light--again, no such luck.

What can I do now??? I want this thing off for good!

 
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The only way to reset it is to make the reset switch work. Or maybe cut the LED off of the circuit board.

Take apart cluster, repair the bad reset switch or solder leads and run them to a remote reset switch.

Search this forum, I'm pretty sure there's at least one thread that describes this fix in greater detail.

 
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IIRC, there is a thread on how to repair a worn-out trip button, but not a broken reset switch. I could be wrong tho. Even though I've already searched this topic on the forum, I'll do a more in-depth search when I'm not working.

 
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not sure if this works or not, but try disconnecting the battery for an hour or two????

 
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I think the tip of the plunger wears over time.


Someone add a pad, or similar to the plunger IIRC.

 
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Disconnect battery cables and touch cables together to hard reset?

 
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Battery disconnect cannot reset the maintenance light.

 
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LOL
I was speaking as a technician, not a moderator.

 
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https://www.civicforums.com/forums/2...light-fix.html

 
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What took you so long? LOL

 
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Alternative to putting in a parallel switch, what I did was physically replace the switch on my cluster. I used an old tactile momentary NO switch (sourced from an old DLP big screen, I'm sure you can find a bunch on ebay for cheap). Figured out which pins on the old switch and new switch were the negative and positive terminals. Desoldered the old switch, soldered in the new one, called it a day. This procedure did, however, require me to remove the fuel gauge needle, but as long as you mark where it was when the car is on, you'll be fine. My trip reset button works like day 1 with my car again, with a bit more of a tactile feel, since the original switch uses a capacitive backing on a rubber.. nipple.. thing.. to make contact.

Edit: the switch I used is quite similar to this one

All I did was google "smd tactile pushbutton switch"

If you decide to go this route, a few things:
1) I'm not responsible if you mess something up
2) make sure it's a momentary NO (normally open) switch. The one I used measures ~6mm x 6mm. It fit fine, IIRC, maybe just a bit of bending of the pins to make the sit nicely

 
Rep Power: 366

While dash is out, stick a tape. Mileage reset will not work, though...