Ok, so here's the deal. This is mostly a nusiance I think but it honestly has started to drive me slightly nuts.

'92 100 S. I have had what I call "The Bomb" (cause it looks like one of those old cartoon bombs) warning light on the dash that indicates a problem with the lights. I'm sure some of you know the one I'm talking about. The thing is I cannot get that sucker to go off. I've repeatedly checked all of the lights. Front headlights, tail lights, brake lights and all turn signals appear to work fine. I did find one high beam out, thought "Eureka!", replaced the bulb and hoped all was good.

The warning light is still on though. Do I need to clear it somehow? The manual doesn't say anything about how to clear it other than to address the problem (of course it does tend to err on the side of take your vehicle to your Audi dealer to be serviced for nearly everything).

I checked all of the fuses and they all look good (besides if a fuse was out I'd think one of the lights would be malfunctioning.) According to the manual it indicates a problem with tail lights, headlights or turn signals (any of the lights related to driving safely). I believe brake lights have their own indicator light to let you know they're out, but like I said they're working fine.

Any ideas on how I can get this warning light off? I'm starting to think some of the wiring to the sensor that tells it there is a problem is bad, but I did find the bad high beam that led me to think maybe it just needs to be cleared. I do know that my underhood (engine compartment) lamp and the glove box lamp is out, but the manual doesn't mention anything about this indicator telling you those lights have a problem.

It would just make me feel warm and fuzzy to get an "OK" when I start the car, and make me less paranoid about having to check all my lights constantly just to ensure they're actually working! Any help or insight is greatly appreciated. I'm starting to think I overlooked something quite obvious.

 

Any little bit of corrosion in the bulb holder might send a false signal of an extinguished lamp to the dash..
The common lamps in the indicator circuit on the dash is the headlamps, and tail lamps.

If there's any moisture in your tail lamps lenses, it might cause a bit of a bad connection back there, making the sensor beleive there's a bad lamp.
The easiest thing to do is to remove all of the lamps out of the sockets, and either clean the contacts, or just un-plug, and plug in the lamp over, and over again to get better conduction.


There isn't any type of reset that I know of, and the system isn't affected by secondary lamps such as the interior lamps, liscence tag lamps etc. etc.

Once the system reads all good lamps, it will reset itself.

 

Thanks Sepp. I hadn't thought of that. I'll try cleaning them all out and see that works.

 

Just a bit of WD-40 does wonders as well keeping the corrosion factor down.

Good luck!

 

I had a few minutes to futz around and check the lights a few days ago. I did find my driver side rear taillights were all goofed up. One the bulb was spinning free in the connection housing and the other had one of the little nubs that holds it into the housing broken off. After checking them out they blew my brake light fuse! So I went ahead and replaced them quick. I got an OK light after that for about 10 seconds and then the warning light again. I'll have to go back and clean all the connectors this weekend, but it looks like its a simple fix.

 

Best of luck, be methodical, and paitent, these systems can be quite fussy.

Let us know what you find.

If you can score some dielectric grease (from an electrical store) this works great keeping everything looking, and performing like new.
I use it on all of my cars especially where the loom plugs into the rear lamp assys..this keeps any moisture that's in my trunk, out of the plugs.
Ya might want to check these to see if there funky as well.
It caused mondo problems with my ur Quattro.