Instrument light issues
 

Technically my truck is a 98, not a 98.5 so I maybe should have put this in the other forum with all the other 12 valves, but I have the 99-02 dash unlike 95% of the trucks on [my more appropriate forum] so I thought I might have better luck here. As far as I know, aside from a higher redline our clusters are identical. So anyway:

I have the issue whereby my BRAKE and ABS lights are on all the time. It isn't the E-brake switch, or the thing on the rear end. The computer doesn't show any codes, and the brakes work fine. We're still trying to figure it out, but in the meantime, I drive thousands of miles a month and these idiot lights irritate the hell out of me. The other day I finally had enough, and in a stroke of pure genius </sarc> I got fed up and decided to pull the bulbs out.

Incidentally, the one I got out first was actually for the cruise control. Whoops. I pulled out the one for the ABS and put the cruise one back. Success! Well, sort of. No more ABS light, but the cruise light doesn't work anymore either. I pulled the bulb back out, it looks fine. I put the ABS one back in, the cruise one is still out. But- so is the ABS one. All bulbs are back, and neither of them work. Curiously, my high beam indicator hasn't worked since I removed and put these two back either. The high beams work, but no blue indicator. The cruise control works, but no green indicator. Fuses are all good, bulbs all look good. I have no idea what I could have fragged up in there, but it's too big a coincidence that none of these three lights work anymore immediately after I was screwing around with 2 out of 3 of them, right? Oh, I never could get at the bulb for the BRAKE light, which at this point is probably just as well. Anyone know how I broke this?

Nobody?

---AutoMerged DoublePost---

So the high beam indicator just started working again today on it's own. that part is starting to look like an uncommon coincidence. Still no cruise or ABS lights though. Bulbs are good, so WTF?

Starting simple, have you tried disconnecting the batteries for an hour, or overnight and seeing if that helps?

My cruise "light" is in my odometer window, not a separate bulb. Sounds like we have different dashes.

I would be looking at all of the connections under the hood, in the area of the ABS controller and brakes.

Disconnecting the batteries has cleared the codes, but they come back as soon as I go a little way up the road. My bigger concern is why the lights aren't working at all now after pulling the bulbs and putting them back. If the bulbs are good, and they look fine, it just doesn't make sense.

When you pulled the bulbs out did you check to see if you are getting power and ground at the light socket? That will tell you a lot. :c:

Any chance the bulbs are LEDs? They will only work one way.

As far as I know they're OEM, so I doubt it.

I didn't put a test light on them while the bulbs were out, but I'm not sure it would tell me anything since I have to unplug the cluster to get at them so it would be dead even getting power isn't the issue.

True that was a duh moment on my part. Easy way to test the lights: get some jumper wires and use a 9 volt battery to make sure they light up. Just because they look good doesn't mean they are. Also you can check the truck side of the wire harness to find the light wire and make sure it is giving power when lights are on.

Well, everything else lights up. All the other idiot lights, instrument lights, everything but those two. Oh, and the high beam indicator, which stopped working again. Everything was perfect until I pulled the cluster out the other day. :argh:

I would test the bulbs man.