At 05:00 PM 11/7/2010  +0000, Joy Hecht wrote:
>Mine has mysteriously gone on and off for years.  Assuming we're talking
>about the same light - the one that's at around "eight o'clock" on the dial
>with the tach.  The one that should come on for a second or two when you
>turn the engine on, just to check that it's working, and then go off.

Joy, there are three lights, two in between the speedo and tach and
one smack in the middle of the temp gauge.  On your 2.1l (Matilda
*is* a 2.1l, right?), when you turn the key on you should see solid
red on the left (ALT) light, blinking red on the right (OIL) light
and blinking that stops after 2-3 seconds on the OVERHEAT/LOW COOLANT light.

I think you're talking about the third one, yes?

Wait until a time when the intermittent problem surfaces and talk to
me -- It's a simple system and we can solve its problem.  Seriously.

Vis-a-vis the rest of your tale -- on both those occasions the lights
did exactly what they were supposed to.  The buzzer was from low oil pressure.

Just because it needs to be said as often as possible -- any of those
three lights lighting on the road should be a "stop Right Now and
diagnose before proceeding" warning.  These aluminum engines do not
suffer overheating gladly -- and if the ALT light goes, there's a
fair chance it's a broken belt, in which case you have no cooling.

Yours,
David