piper aztec gear down lights - dim nose wheel light when panel light rheostat dimmer

[Coopere]

Curious if anyone has run into this before,

my gear down lights work perfectly except when I turn the panel lighting rheostat on, when the panel lights are on, the nose gear light is much dimmer than the left and right main lights, ive tried swapping bulbs (main to centre (nose)) no effect and same result. if I turn the panel dimmer off so that the panel lights are off the brightness of the gear lights comes up and all 3 are very bright and visible.

I have swapped a gear up light lens into the nose position when the dimmer is turned on (panel lights on) and the nose light is actually illuminated but as I have said its much dimmer than the 2 mains.

with the green lens on its quite hard to see at night that the nose light is illuminated without switching the dimmer off

I hadn't done a night flight in awhile, and was surprised on my walk around that this happened, scrubbed my night flight until I can get it resolved

I suspect the rheostat panel light dimmer is on its way out... would this make sense?

thanks
Eric

 

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