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Who owns a cavalier, and who can help?
I got my first "Service" light tonight, and its driving me insane to think of what is truely wrong with my car.
I did find a problem that is newly occuring, and my running lights down work, and when I turn on my brights, one of my lights is out, but only while I have my brights on.
When a headlight goes out, is this enough to trigger a "Service" message?
How much damage am I looking at here?
does the light just say "service" or does it say "service engine soon"?
The light just says "Service" there is a "Check Engine" light, but thank god thats not on...
as for the lights it sounds like a relay problem. and usually having a light out wont turn on a service light but then again i dont know. if its just a service light it might, but if it says Service engine soon, then a light usually wouldnt affect it. whens the last time you had your oil changed? it could be something with your fuel pump or lines? lot of possibilities. id say just take it to the dealership and have them take a look, hopefully its still under warrenty. good luck.
sorry, i was typing when you were typing lol. not sure about the "service" light. im not real familiar with chevy's
I hope so, just had the oil changes last week
The "service" light is no big deal. This only comes on a predetermined point, usually after X amount of miles, or Y gallons of gas consumed. These service lights are almost always resettable by the user, usually some combination like "turn the ignition key to the first click, hit the brakes then count to ten."
I searched the J-body forum; what a wretched hive of scum and villany. Not a single clueful post. I found a couple of half-useful posts elsewhere:
Link 1
Link 2
I think your best bet is to go to an Autozone store and have them read the computer codes for you. They do this for free. I don't know if they can reset the light for you.
Bottom line: probably nothing wrong with your car at all.
They in all odds can reset the light for you, it could depend on how well you know them. The problem is it may just come back very soon if something is actually wrong... so even if they reset it the faulty part will soon trigger it again.Originally Posted by EastGermanOlympicJudge
What they do Sethy is check the code....check it against a book (to find out exactly what the code means) then they relay that information to you. They could probably just reset it if it will go away just from reseting it (Again depending on how well you know them because they really shouldnt just reset it), however if not, they could tell you what parts you need to buy then give you them...have you fix the problem and go an reset it. Now remember after you get the code cleared it takes about 100miles for everything to reset to its previous state.
(I dnk where you are from but if you pull up a code remember in some states if your vehicle is a 1997 or later you cannot pass your inspection (NYS is this way), so just remember that if you plan on getting the vehicle inspected anytime soon.) It doesnt sound like a big problem though.
Well that's half my point here. The "service" light doesn't come on when something's wrong - it comes on after a predetermined interval. The "check engine light" WILL come on when the OBD system discovers a fault. Sethy indicated that the CEL was not on.
I really think this is just an oil-change reminder or whatever. Wouldn't worry about it at all. Maybe check the owner's manual to see if there's a way you can reset it yourself, since you just had the oil changed.
Well that's half my point here. The "service" light doesn't come on when something's wrong - it comes on after a predetermined interval. The "check engine light" WILL come on when the OBD system discovers a fault. Sethy indicated that the CEL was not on.
I really think this is just an oil-change reminder or whatever. Wouldn't worry about it at all. Maybe check the owner's manual to see if there's a way you can reset it yourself, since you just had the oil changed.
Yeah I just was pretty much agreeing with ya...just adding more on ya know as far as the 'check engine' light, because sometimes (do to electronics being haywire, the service light may come on...even though its actually a different fault)... I know exactly what ur saying 'check engine' would come on if anything was mechanically wrong with the vehicle (inhibiting its ability to function properly) ...the Service light often comes on in peroidicals when most maitnence is needed (looking the in the manual you will probably find at this mileage you will have little 'dots' all the way down your mile mark of what needs to be changed/replaced/checked at this mileage. Again though... there have been cases of a vehicle presenting a 'service' light code when actually it was preempting an electrical system failure that came (I forgot exactly from what...this was a case when I dealt with car audio, so it can actually detect a mechanical problem that could soon lead to a check engine).
Basically as 'eastgermanOJ' said it in all odds is nothing major and if you look in your manual (The table that says what needs to be done at a certain mileage, often towards the back of it...near the service logs and diagrams, you will have many if not 3/4 of the sections of the table filled in with 'black dots' to remind you you 'should' have those done) its probably just reminding you or what what needs to be done, But again it could be something wrong with the electrical system.
As for the headlight deal . I would change the bulbs (immediate action) on then proceed to check for shorts in the wiring if this does not fix the problem with the headlights being out..... Also some headlights are configured so that high and low beams are essentially seperate entities (not sure about the cavi) so it may just be normal and u never noticed it before...but ifnot (and id assume its not the case since you just noticed it), just change the bulbs (even if they seem fine...they are cheap) and check for shorts leading to them.
Problem with cars unless one is there to actually look at and diagnose the problem its tough to tell wether everything is just coincidence or what is actually wrong or whatever else...way to many variables to give a straight 100% awnser.
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