I have a 03 Saturn L200. The climate control screen is blank (it should at least show the outside temp) I can’t turn it on by any of the controls. The dome light is out and the vanity mirror lights are out as well…My first thought is a fuse is blown, but according to the manual I couldn’t find the proper fuse. Any ideas would be apprciated as I don’t want to spend a $50+ charge for a $2 fuse Thanks!
well, the simple (albeit time consuming) is to remove each fuse, one by one, and put a known good fuse in its place.
go buy two 20 amp fuses and start swapping.
just pay attention to which fuses go where. so you keep the correct amperage fuses in their correct slot.
Fuses are usually way over sized in value for the use. The function is basically to prevent the wires from burning up. It could be a rare case of mechanical fuse failure, but I would count on the problem showing up again and needing a real repair. The manual can be a little cryptic, use process of elimination to select out fuses that it is definitely not.
It’s a fuse fer sure but you are looking in the wrong place. Your car has several fuse boxes. Look under the hood for a plastic box containing various fuses and relays.
Thanks for all the suggestions. Per the manual the fuse might be a 10 amp flat blade or one of those square relays…the flat blade looked intact, but I didn’t test it. and the square relay I don’t know how to test.
dont go by looks, sometimes a blown fuse looks ok, but isnt. by removing the fuse, and putting in a known good one you eliminate the fuses quickly.
Looking at a drawing for this the relay is there for the compressor clutch so if the compressor is working then the relay is ok.
Fuse #3 in the fuse panel under the dash ties to the HVAC module. Another fuse called the BCM fuse, #2 in the panel under the hood, may be for used for some memory, also ties to the HVAC unit.
Use a Volt/Ohm meter to check the condition of your fuses. They’re inexpensive through places like Harbor Freight. Do you have a friend that has a V.O.M.? Borrow it. You might want to get a cheap, plastic fuse puller designed for pulling double-spade type fuses. Heck, you’ve got to pull the darned things anyway! Instead of pulling out and replacing every fuse, test them individually. If you find a defective one, “while you’re there”, pull the rest of them, also. You just might find another weak fuse. Replace as necessary using the exact same size fuse, i.e.: 2A, 5A, 10A, etc. It’s a lot cheaper but more labor intensive. Just set the V.O.M. for resistance on “1”. Connect one probe of the meter to one leg of the fuse and the other probe to the other leg. Use your index finger and thumb to hold the probe to the spade. Don’t worry–you won’t feel even a slight tingle as you’re ‘connected to’ small DC current batteries. If the needle on the meter moves, that fuse is O.K. If no needle movement, BAD fuse. If the needle moves, stops, then starts going back towards zero, that fuse is about to go bad. By your description, you have a typical GM fuse system. One fuse is quite often used for the interior dome light, foot well lights, some of the dashboard lights. While you’re at it, if your manual doesn’t have the fuse amps listed, write down the fuse sizes. And they’re also color coded by the amps rating. Buy 1 extra fuse of each amperage and store them in your glove compartment or console. Of course, get two of the bad fuse’s size. The plastic fuse pullers help those of us with big fingers to get a grip on those little fuses and are especially helpful to those who might worry about damaging fingernails. Total cost? I’m guessing no more than $2 for the puller and probably $1.50 each for the fuses. Plus your time. That’s where you’d get killed having a mechanic do it–labor intensive = time. If all fuses check out to be o.k., it’s time to get started on a damaged or disconnected wire somewhere. Almost always, it’s a fuse.
It could be a fuse or a ground problem.
Here are the fuses to check…
BCM #2 fuse 10 AMP - under hood fuse block
HVAC blower fuse 40 amp - under hood fuse block
IGN #3 relay - left instrument panel fuse block
IGN #3 fuse 10 amp - left instrument panel fuse block
If they all check out then you need to check all of the grounds for the system.
Just a little tech service tip here.
When checking for bad fuses you can also check them without removing them from the slot. There are small slots on top of each side of the fuse element you can place a meter probe tip on to check each side of the fuse if you are checking for voltage. If there isn’t any voltage tieing to the circuit at the time you can also check the resistance across the element, just as you would with it removed from the circuit, but using the slots instead.