Blind Diodes
We've already covered blind plugs quite a bit. And the '82 VW Passat GL 5, which we featured a few days ago (report to follow), certainly had quite a few of them on board.
But what also caught our attention in this early '80s Passat were the “blind diodes.”
And there were more than a handful of them in the Passat. They're located in the center of the dashboard, and of course—provided they're installed and in working order—they're also clearly labeled.
The car had LEDs for the turn signals, the battery charge, low oil pressure, and the high beams—the latter, incidentally, in yellow, because blue LEDs weren't available back then.
At first glance, it's unclear which functions these remaining lights were intended for—perhaps for activated fog lights or….
In any case, the complexity that such “reserve” functions (complete with corresponding labels) may have created during production is impressive. In an age when cars have everything built in and functions are activated via software, it's almost impossible for us to imagine this level of meticulous detail from the early 1980s…
P.S. The fuel consumption and gear indicator at the top is also impressive, by the way, but that's another topic…
