Blank Nav Display
 

The display on my Monsoon Nav system began blinking off and on last week and has now gone completly dark. I see where the wires run from the display to the head unit when the display is opened to access the DVD player for the Nav disc. My questions are:

1. Has anyone else experienced this and is there a simple remedy?

2. Can one purchase a replacement display alone, not the entire head unit, and if so, where?

Thanks in advance for any help or solutions offered, as it would be a shame to have to trash the entire unit because of the display inoperability.

Did you do a search and not find what you wanted ?
There has been much about this problem and a fix of sorts for the screen problem
which I solved and posted below
You don't mention if anything else is working or not, like music and other controls
This would be important to know, because it could be a display problem or just a blown fuse
for the radio


Check this out if it is just the display that is bad

https://www.hummerforums.com/forum/h...-update-26219/

Thanks, wfturner! Did all kinds of searches for a couple days, but came up mostly emptyNew to the forum and still learning the nav process here =D.

Have read the referenced link and found the problems others have encountered mirror mine exactly. So... off for new battery terminals, contact cleaner and a dose of patience (Firemen have a tendicy to rush in to things- LOL)!

Will update later today. Again- thanks for your help in pointing me in the right direction.

Also...

The interior light dimmer did not operate when I purchased the H3. About a week or so ago, it started mysteriously working; about the same time the screen started flickering. Maybe some cleaning of thar connector and application of the carbon conductive grease might be in order as well?

Couldnt hurt, would you think?

Yes, that couldn't hurt

Battery terminal upgrades are a smart and easy thing to do.
The stock ones are pretty cheap. Electrical problems can be very tricky to solve.

To answer to one of your earlier questions is that the actual tilt down LCD screen cannot be replaced.
The entire head unit is one piece. You'll notice the ribbon connector is plastic welded into place.
Also, one culprit I am convinced contributes to this flickering and occasional blank screen, is the electrical lead from the light switch. The LCD screen brightens and dims when you turn the light switch. That is just my guess after all that I have researched.

Remember "Carbon Conductive Grease" There are similar products, but this worked for me
My Nav. has been in daily use for months now and not one flicker or going blank.

Good Luck and let us know how it works out

just to update with my experiences on this.

I have the Monsoon touch screen unit. It flickered from time to time when I had the car in the UAE. I've since shipped it to the UK and one day as I started up the screen flickered and went black. After that it was always black.

After reading suggestions here I removed dash board and wiggled and cleaned plugs behind the unit but that didn't seem to help. I then held down the eject button for a good 10 to 20 seconds so that the front screen pops off (same way you'd change the nav CD).

I saw the 2 ribbon cables connecting screen to rest of unit. Wiggled them a fair bit and after I closed the screen back up it flickered and went dark again. Convinced that this was therefore the cause of the issues I repeated, wiggling a bit more. Its been fine since then. So I'm pretty convinced that its these ribbon cables that are the problem... makes sense as the screen was dark but stereo continued to work fine, so it did seem like it was just the screen connection that was bad.

I hope this helps anyone else having this problem (though I imagine there may be different causes for different users).

I too, thought that the ribbon connector was a problem and basically did what you suggested. My ribbon connector was plastic welded on both the screen and the head unit.
After checking that out (wiggling wires) carefully, that fixed my problem for awhile.
Then I ended up getting another complete brand new unit and after awhile the problem came back.
That made me believe it was not the actual screen or its connection. My problem is now solved. Hope yours stays fixed

Give us an update down the road.

I have been having the same exact problem the past few days (flickering) then the screen went completely dark yesterday. I tried all the suggestions (battery terminals, removed/cleaned the connectors in back of the radio, added Carbon Conductive Grease and ejected the front screen to access the nav disc. None of these seemed to affect the problem. Then I noticed that when the unit is open, there are tabs holding the faceplate buttons on. I loosened the tabs and partially removed the faceplate. Then I put it back on and closed up the unit and it came on bright just like normal. I'm not sure how long that will last, but my problem seems to be related to the faceplate connection. The ribbon cables did not seem loose. If this goes bad again and gets worse, I may need to just get a new nav radio. Any suggestions for something that has all the same functionality, will work with car chimes, OnStar, XM/Sirius and the existing NAV antenna? I don't want to do a bunch of soldering and rewiring, I am just wondering whether there are any 'plug and play' nav units out there that come with a wiring harness (or seperate harness at a cost) that will basically fit the space and operate with everything just like the factory unit. My H3 is the '07 lux package. Thanks.

Glad your screen is now working. Sorry that my detailed clean connector, slightly bend female connector tabs and carbon conductive grease, didn't fix your particular problem.

You may already know that the light switch is also part of the screen brightness function.
That is the very reason why I was convinced that the back head unit connector, that has a connection to the light switch, was to blame. I just felt so confident when it got mine fixed, that this was the problem.

If you do get good results from what you've done, please let us all know you are back to a normal screen.

I know of no aftermarket units that will do all the functions of a factory head unit

OK, thanks. So far, so good. I fear that if it was this easy to 'fix' by loosening then snapping the faceplate back on, then the problem is bound to return after I hit a few pot holes. We will see, I will post any news. Thanks for your reply on the replacement, I have performed many searches and I cannot find an easy replacement for the nav radio - everything I have found seems to require extensive modifications and wiring.