Help Dash lights won't go off

[RTVing]

The dash board lights are blinking on and off. Master power is off. Key is out.

Just bought the new Seneca home. Can not find anything in trouble shooting or any one of 40 manuals we have.

Thank you so much for any help any one can give us.

[RVermont]

Restart truck and make sure trans is in neutral and brake is set. Turn everything off and see if that resets it. I was having a similar issue and the unit was saying brakes were not set. Only happened once and really never figured out the problem. Which chassis do you have? I also had an issue when I installed a scan gauge with a bad wire, the wire was shorting out the error control system and was cycling the circuits causing lights to go on and off

Welcome to the Seneca family and the jayco owners forum. Just ask and people will jump in to help you. Great resource here.

[RTVing]

Had to go to bed with the challenge unsolved. This morning started everything up, turned off reset brakes, etc. And the blinking dash finally went off.

Saw another thread last night about an un-named (as in it is in not in any of the manuals) button under the dash, left side, that others had pushed and their similar problem stopped. We did that but it did not work for us.

So that is over. And hope for us it was a one off.

Thank you

[SloPoke]

Most of our electrical systems are shared with the other FL models. This is from the Cascadia owners manual:

If the emergency power supply system activates, do
not shut down the engine until the vehicle is in a safe
position to do so. It will not be able to be restarted
until the problem is corrected. If emergency power
mode is due to a SAM Cab fault, the gauges will become unresponsive but the engine will remain running until it is turned off.
When the ignition is in the ON position, the emergency power supply will cause the following lamps to
flash:
• dash panel lights
• clearance lights
• front marker lights
• side marker lights
• trailer taillights
• rear stop lights


Page 3.4 of this manual:
https://dtnacontent-dtna.prd.freight...s%20Manual.pdf

[RTVing]

So I am excited to contribute for the first time. There was another similar question that I will post reply on as well.

Per John in Jayco Motorized Service.

If I get this a little wrong forgive. I am paraphrasing.

The Chasis systems are 24 volt, the house is 12 volt. When you turn off the engine there is sometimes need to disperse the extra voltage/energy. (I know I forgot the terminology.) This may be the radio flashing or like what happened to us the instrument panel. Once dispersed it stops blinking. For us it would be off by morning but took a few hours. So John said was normal. Yay!!!

[Rustynuts]

Originally Posted by RTVing

So I am excited to contribute for the first time. There was another similar question that I will post reply on as well.

Per John in Jayco Motorized Service.

If I get this a little wrong forgive. I am paraphrasing.

The Chasis systems are 24 volt, the house is 12 volt. When you turn off the engine there is sometimes need to disperse the extra voltage/energy. (I know I forgot the terminology.) This may be the radio flashing or like what happened to us the instrument panel. Once dispersed it stops blinking. For us it would be off by morning but took a few hours. So John said was normal. Yay!!!

Freightliner chassis are 12 volt, not 24 volt.

[Hayman281]

Did you figure out the problem with your dash lights blinking on and off? I just bought a 2019 Seneca 37HJ and it is doing the same thing. Had me excited when you were told the chassis was 24 volt, then Rustnuts said it wasn't it was 12 volt. Just was thinking if that was the problem, did you get it fixed or is it still blinking on and off when you stop. You can check the voltage by looking at your chassis batteries, if they are wired positive to positive it is 12 volt, positive to negative it is 24 volt.

[Bob and Brenda]

This question has been posted in the past. A quick search would have given you an immediate answer. The Freightliner frame has a problem and pressing the white button on the left bottom of the dash or turning the ignition on but not starting it will turn them off. We have had this problem numerous time but it is an easy solution. Good luck.

[RTVing]

No it has not been fixed. the challenge continues. The rig has has been to Freightliner. They said.... wait for it...They can not find any harm being done by the blinking.. so once something bad happens they can fix it.

We are leaving for our maiden voyage TODAY!!!! So excited. Will pursue resolution again. It is annoying but need to after 4 months of ownership go somewhere! So to the RV Dreams Rally in Pahrump we go.

The whole story about the voltage was never spoken of again and seemed that no one else had ever heard of such an explanation.

We have 2019 Seneca K so we should keep in touch on what we find out.

[Rustynuts]

Do you by chance have a Scangage installed? Mine did this an it came down to a short circuit in the Scangage. Scangage repaired it and it has not done it again.

[Hayman281]

Originally Posted by Bob and Brenda

This question has been posted in the past. A quick search would have given you an immediate answer. The Freightliner frame has a problem and pressing the white button on the left bottom of the dash or turning the ignition on but not starting it will turn them off. We have had this problem numerous time but it is an easy solution. Good luck.

The white button you are speaking of is the power boost button in case your chassis batteries are weak. You can hold that button in and it boost your starting batteries so you can start the engine off the house batteries. I have tried turning the key on and off to no avail.

[Hayman281]

We will stay in touch. Our Seneca is at Freightliner right now, been there for a week. All they have told me that it is a house problem not a chassis problem. They told me that when they unplug the house wiring harness from the chassis, it stops. The dealer tells me that it's a chassis problem. It may not hurt anything by blinking but I know that it is not normal, its very annoying to sit and listen to the dash click and blink for 2 hours.

[Ender on the road]

Well I brought my 2019 Seneca home a week ago and while fiddling with it this weekend I spotted this problem as well. I have turned it on, then off. Pushed that button. Driven it and parked and reset the brake. All of these have not done anything to make this problem go away. Going off for our first trip this morning, but will call the dealership first. I worked electronics for a long time and figure it is a glitch in the cluster control board which is fairly expensive and neither Freightliner or Jayco will want to pony up the money to replace it on a guess.
We shall see....

[Hayman281]

Originally Posted by RTVing

No it has not been fixed. the challenge continues. The rig has has been to Freightliner. They said.... wait for it...They can not find any harm being done by the blinking.. so once something bad happens they can fix it.

We are leaving for our maiden voyage TODAY!!!! So excited. Will pursue resolution again. It is annoying but need to after 4 months of ownership go somewhere! So to the RV Dreams Rally in Pahrump we go.

The whole story about the voltage was never spoken of again and seemed that no one else had ever heard of such an explanation.

We have 2019 Seneca K so we should keep in touch on what we find out.

Well here is the latest on the dash blinking on our 37HJ. The electrical system on the house is back feeding into the chassis wiring harness and is causing the dash to blink. Freightliner is going to install a diode in the harness to stop the back feed. Hopefully that corrects the problem. My freightliner dealer contacted the house builder "Jaco" and that's what they told them to do, hope it works.

[Hayman281]

Have fun on your trip, check out my last post, might have came up with a fix. We have had ours since December and have made 4 trips. The blinking don't seem to have any adverse affect on the coach but is annoying. Hope this helps. It seems to be an electrical back feed from the house to the chassis.

[LaMigra]

I am at a Freightliner Rally and I was having the same problem. The trainer/mechanic from the factory looked over my rig and was baffled, he had not seen this before. He called back to the factory and spoke with a Freightliner rep to Jayco. He said Jayco is fully aware of the issue. The cause is, Freightliner wires the dash to turn off when you turn off the ignition. Jayco, wired the radio to Freightliners panel to stay on, which is causing feedback, aka dash lights flickering.

I was instructed to contact John Haynes at Jayco and he will troubleshoot the issue with you. Hope that helps.

[Hayman281]

Thanks for the info, wiring the diode in my harness from the home builder stopped the dash from blinking but now its feeding back through the equalizer levelling system and it wont self level. And you are right the radio is hot all the time, even when key is off. Please let us know what the Jaco guy finds out.

[Ender on the road]

The cause is, Freightliner wires the dash to turn off when you turn off the ignition. Jayco, wired the radio to Freightliners panel to stay on, which is causing feedback, aka dash lights flickering.

Hmmm that does not make a lot of sense. Constant power would mean constant flashing and yours, Hayman281, and my Seneca the flashing stops by itself.

A couple of things I have noted. The first is the engine does not need to run to set off the flashing. Simply putting the ignition switch to aux will set it off. Once set off it must complete the 2 hour cycle to stop. Second opening the drivers door which turns on the dash and the center display does not set the flashing off. This says that the startup sequence where the gauges are all cycled must be initiated to start the flashing. I have not sat there and completely timed this flashing sequence but it is very nearly the two hours Hayman281 noted. This points not to a wiring problem but to a lighting control board firmware problem.

If I could get LaMirga and Hayman281 to actually time the flashing we could confirm a board problem. If all three of our Senecas flash for the same time (give or take a second or two depending on the voltage of the batteries and the clock chip timing) it will be a board/firmware problem. Although confirmation will not entice Freightliner to fix said board. That will be an expensive (think warranty issue) fix for a problem that cause nothing more than some minor irritation.

[LaMigra]

Sorry but I’m still at the Freightliner Rally. The needles and the dash lights flicker every second, like the the second hand of a clock. Like you said, it takes about two hours before it stops.

Ive been told the reason the dash lights stop and start, the radio times out. But, it will continue to cycle and try to turn itself on, which then feedbacks to the dash.

Apparently Jayco will walk you through the fix or so I’m being told.

[Hayman281]

Mine does last about 2 hrs, but it will randomly just start all over again. Maybe 2 days later and I don't recall turning the ignition back on.