Over the weekend I swapped out my headlights on my 2006 prius to a new new of HID bulbs due to the intermittent on/off issue. The change was very easy to do, took less than 30 minutes for the pair. Today was the first day I drove the car since, and when I turn on the running lights or headlights my dash goes black. The navigation system seems to dim itself, so I'm not sure what it could be. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated before I take it over to Toyota? Given the estimate they gave me to replace the bulbs, $500 (I did for $1135 if you consider the price of the bulbs and 30 minutes labor at $100), I would prefer to find my own solution rather than getting bent over by them.
Well I did that as soon as I got home and low and behold the guys who recently tinted the windows in the Prius must have turned the dimmer switch all of the way down. When I turned it back up to full power and turned on the lights the dash stayed on. How embarrassing!
This is a problem with the UK and Euro versions of the Prius. When you turn on side lamps or head lamps the MFD and speedo display go dim, there is a setting on the MFD to overcome this for the MFD, but not the speedo. We do not have the dimmer control for the dash lights. It is a requirement within the EU that if it is raining headlights must be switched on even in the daytime making it difficult at times to be able to see the speedo at all.
The dimmer control was not the only important feature left off the gen2 Prius in the UK, we also did not get heated mirrors in a country that in the winter gets heavy frosts and damp conditions. It seems in Florida heated mirrors are standard, there's real logic there somewhere.
