First off, I'd like to say hello and that I'm glad I could join a nice community like this to discuss anything Accord related. Now to my issues, I have a 1996 Honda Accord LX sedan with a 2.2L 4-cylinder engine with the 5-speed manual transmission (only has 135,000 miles). The car drives wonderfully except for three issues:

1. The dashboard lights are so dim at night that you can't even see the needles on the speedometer or tachometer. You can barely even see your speed or RPM's. Being new to a manual transmission, it makes it hard to drive at night. I'm wondering if it is possible to take off the dash to get to the gauges behind it to change a bulb or something and how to do it.

2. The car makes this weird whistling or almost squeal like noise that goes away when I press the clutch in, but any other time the clutch is not engaged or partially engaged, the noise remains. It doesn't sound damaging, but is really annoying. Any ideas what this could be?

3. The last thing is noted in the pictures. What is the object circled in the first picture? Closer up in the second, you can see the line going in to it is cracked. Is this an issue and is it easy/inexpensive to fix or is it as harmless as a scratch in your paint?

Thanks so much in advance.

 

#1 Is your dimmer switch for the dash working ? But yeah you should be able to pull the cluster out and change the bulb in it, only take me less than 5 minutes to pull my cluster out in my 99, but not sure how complicate for the 5th gen Accord. #2 could be a bad throwout bearing or lack of grease in the shiftfork where it contact with the slave push pin. #3 looks like a cruise control unit.

 

Yes, the dimmer switch works but on max it is barely lighting up the dash.

I can do some basic car maintenance but is this hard to do for someone with limited experience?

Is that crack in the plastic causing any issues? I never use the cruise control so it doesn't affect me.

 

I have same defect on cruise control actuator of my 94 EX. I secured w/ safety wire w/o further problems.

good luck

 

Thank you, that's what I was hoping for.

 

You can pull the cluster out and change the bulbs, but i think you can only get them from the dealer. You could bring it to a transmission shop and have them check it out for you on the noise issue, but it might cost you up to $40, but if you have them do the repair then they could save you that $40 toward the bill :-)

 

Thank you guys, you two have mostly answered my questions. My only concern left is how to remove the part of the dash to get to the instrument cluster to change the bulbs. I found two screws but nothing else and it still won't budge. Any ideas?

 

Scratch that, I found several sites with instructions how to do so. Thanks guys.

 

These are the LED i use for my cars alot better then OEM

LED Vehicle Bulb Finder

 

For some reason these transmission bulbs (D4 bulb) are prone to fail on Acura TL's, but rarely on Accords. I've changed one on 97 Acura TL I have.

Nice post.

good luck