I own a 2001 model Gen3 with the white LCD display. Like so many other people on this forum my display was missing a stack of characters - the time was useless, the date was semi-useless, none of the radio controls (balance, fader, etc.) showed.
I decided to replace my Pajero radio this weekend and had to pull out the console. While it was out I thought I'd give the display a go. My characters used to appear and disappear when you pushed the display near the set button, which to me was some indication that a repair should be possible.
Okay, to strip the console, look here - http://www2.pajeroclub.com.au/forum/sho ... php?t=7426
The actual cause of the the LCD breaking appears to be vibration. The LCD module itself is quite large and surrounded by a metal frame. When I stripped mine I saw that three of the soldered LCD module mount points had broken and allowed the module to move slightly. Resoldering these points with a bit more solder fixed that.
With those points being broken, there is obviously unnecessary vibration between the LCD module and the PCB board it's meant to be attached to. That causes unnecessary stress on the LCD display solder points themselves and they also break. Looking at the rear of my module I could see that the last 10 or so joints on the left of the LCD module appeared to be broken. This corresponded with the missing characters on the right of my display.
Once I resoldered the main LCD module mount points, I resoldered the last 20 or so LCD pins. Obviously this may be different for you, my LCD was only fault on the right as both those LCD mount points were broken, only one was broken on the left. It's a bit of a messy job, everything is covered with resin and it turns into quite a sticky messy when you resolder, but a hot iron and some extra solder re-fastens those connections perfectly.
Reassemble and put back.
This small soldering job fixed all the missing characters on my display. I even plugged the original radio back in and checked the radio characters that were missing before, everything worked!
Photo below, the man LCD mount points are circled in white. The pins that I resoldered are marked with black, depending on how your unit failed you may need to resolder other pins.
Hope that helps.
-Thomas
