Is the heat & a/c controls suppose to light up with the rest of the dash gauges in my 79?

Adam,
I know on my 75, they light up, but are hard to see. You can see the lights when it is totally dark outside, but even then, barely enough light to see. When I had my whole console apart I cleaned everything and replaced he bulbs thoughout the console hoping to improve the light, but didn't help much.

I think the 79 is the same as the 80 - the a/c control panel is not lit internally like most modern cars. Instead, if you look at the top of the gauge console (the horizontal part that over-shadows the gauges) you should see a little plastic bump pointing down to the a/c control panel. There's a small red light in there that's supposed to shine down like a spotlight on the controls. If it's working and you put your hand over to play with the radio, you'll see it projected onto the back of your hand! If it's gone, its a console out job (well at least you have to loosen it enough to tilt it forward) It's a special type of bulb too, but I think most of the major suppliers have them, from what I've seen in the catalogues...

I'm not sure about the 79, but the 77-78 have a small bulb on the back of the heater control. To get to it you have to remove the center console cover. I did a lot of these when I was in the Chevy dealer in that time period. I believe yours also has this setup, but memory fades. I thought the 80 did also, in addition to the small light further up. I could be wrong on the 79-80.

Oh sorry Adam, if I'm feeding you false info
I always thought the dash on the 79's was the same as the 80's...
And kstyer, I can definitely say that my 80 only has the little "spotlight" - I've had the heater controls out of mine before, and there's no place for a bulb, or any plugs/wiring connections. Thanks for clearing it up though!

I wasn't sure on the other years. In 77 we had so many console covers fail under warranty, I replaced a ton of them. The heater control was attached to the bottom of the cover with three screws, the cover would break, and the heater control would drop into the console. After about a year they reinforced these screw sites, and that cured the problem. What was putruid was the fact that the 77 heater control was the same one used in the Chevette. I thought that was absurd. I wasn't as familiar with later years, we didn't have that problem anymore, so I didn't do much work on those.

Ken Styer