The display in my climate control panel has been really dim for over a year. Now the level of illumination is very erratic. Most of the time when I first turn the ignition on, the display will be quite bright. However, within about 5 minutes I won't be able to see anything at all.

My independent repair shop tells me all they can do is take it to an electronics place, and it will probably be at least $200 just to take the unit out to test it. Is there any other way to troubleshoot this problem?

 

You need to remove the climate control circuit board and resolder its resistors. Here is a link that shows the steps required to do this.

http://www.brookins.us/accontroller/index.html

The circuit boards shown are in 2000-04 C5s, I believe. Older C5s have boards that look a bit different. There should be two boards in the temp controller box that you need to remove. The board having the poorly-soldered resistors is the one in the back of the box. I resoldered mine, last year.

 

perfect. im going to fix mine now. thanks.