Dark dash lights, ie. no dash lights

New to me today, used 04 tundra, access cab, 4.7, 4x4.
Bought in sunlight. Didn't know till near home nearing dark that dash lights don't come on.
Spinning proper knob (on lower left dash) for dimming dash lights does nothing except spin back and forth.
Is this more likely a particular fuse issue (where?, which one?), light issue, adjust knob issue, or wiring issue? Please.

 

Official welcome....

 

Do the gauges work? If yes, sounds like you may be getting something to the cluster, I doubt anything is unhooked. Not sure on your 04 by my 4WD 06 I believe the dash lights are tied to the 10A gauge fuse, almost at top-center. Fuse panel on the lower dash left of the steering wheel.

 

Gauges work. No indication of this problem before/after I bought the truck until encountered dusk/low light near home. Realized then no dash lights. No amount of turning the adjustment knob, (verified at home "it" was the one for it) no turning gave me dash light.

Just checked "the" 10 amp fuse with meter for resistance. Zero resistance, ie. same reading as with both leads tightly touching one another. So seems to say fuse is good, through and through. No visible sign of any break or damage. Checked "all"/each other fuses visually in that panel for "any" indication any had a break. No breaks visible. 10 amp was only one tested with meter.

My next step seems to be pull what the adjuster mechanism knob fastens to and test it somehow, as well as test the power/ground leads to it.
Dang, I hate trouble shooting electrical!

 

Yeah, sounds like checking the dimmer switch is the next logical step. Someone else around here just had a similar problem and it turned out to be the dimmer switch, I had the same happen in my T100 and it was the dimmer.
It was awhile ago when mine went in the T100, but irc you can just bridge the wires and bypass the switch, you’ll just have 100% brightness, but will tell you if that’s the problem.

 

Appreciate the heads up about by pass the switch for verification/possible lights regardless whether dim-able. Key is lights.

 

@shifty` is good peeps.

 

OK, update time for me, the OP, re. my dark dash.
Once again, owners manual comes through.
On 04 Tundras, there is not only a dial "dimmer" switch for lighting the instrument panel, but there is also an on/off switch tied into the headlight lever left of the steering wheel. That lever must be out of the "full off" position. 1st click out of "off" turns on "parking, tail, license plate, and ***instrument panel*** lights.
Dimmer dial switch then controls brightness of instrument panel lights. (Yeah, my dimmer dial works!) 2nd click out of off adds the headlights to all the above.

Thanks again for feed back.

Problem now solved. Maybe it'll help some other Tundra owner.

Ready to go to the woods for further testing this week.

Curious. When in 4LO, and automatic trany, which is "better"? Have/leave shifter in drive, or actually shifted in lower gear, or depends on the severity of condition needing 4LO? Yeah, I'll be searching the search engine for relevant input to this end. (But not opposed to a short, quick, answer.)