About a year ago, while driving home, I noticed that my odometer was not lit up. Then, it suddenly came to life. Yesterday, I took my car to be detailed and when I picked it up, the odometer didn't light up. I drove around quite a bit yesterday and a bit today and it still doesn't light up. I suspect one of two things:

#1) There has always been a loose conenction back there
#2) When I had my radio replaced by the dealer three weeks ago, something wasn't re-connected or was bumped. The mechanic who worked on my car, did a crappy job of reassembling the dash as it rattles and squeaks like a bitch.

Can anyone shed some light on this problem? Thanks.

BTW - 2002 Cavalier that is 900 miles from 100,000. I catch a lot of hell from my friends for owning this car, but it has NEVER let me down.




"Beer is proof that God wants us to be happy" - Benjamin Franklin

give it a love tap.. made mine all better.

If the squeeking is bad, take it back, and get them to check the wiring too.

I have the exact same problem with the "not lighting up" odometer. Mine worked just fine for most of the 60 days I had to return the car to the dealer if I wasn't happy but right near the end it went out. It came back on magically when the lady in service pushed the button to read the mileage so they marked it as "problem not detected". Sure enough the second the 60 days was up, out it went never to return again. I had removed the stock CD player and put in a stock RDS deck from an auto wrecker. Don't know if that was related or not but the odometer never worked since. All the dealer offered was to replace the cluster for me, at full price (well over $500) to which I told them politely where they should put it (and it wasn't in my car - :-) ).

I've read a lot of people posting that you need to give the dash a whack and it will sometimes come back on but doesn't work for me. Someone else mentioned resoldering some connections. Does anyone have any knowledge on doing this they could pass along?

I found some guy named Mr. Whizard that works on these problems on the Internet but they want $150 for the repair. Wreckers are charging over $100 for a cluster here but if I can fix it myself that would be preferred. Is it just the LED failing or is it a connection issue??? Any advice would be appreciated.

This is a great forum! I've been reading for hours.

Craig

mine did the same thing about a month ago.

i think its just the light
i ripped apart an 00 cluster, which im still workin on, and it jsut seems f-ed up to me
like the odo is an lcd screen, like an alarm clock, but it had a light bulb behind it (most screens like this light up by themselves)
so i'm assuming that if you resolder the connection for the light bulb it should work, once i get a decent soldering iron ima try this and i will post my results

mine always does that when i hit a speed bump

i just tap it

and it's gets better


STREET LIFE RACING VOL.1 OUT NOW WWW.CRDAONLINE.COM http://www.myspace.com/crdaonline

My Odometer did the same thing i just went to ebay and bought a new cluster they go for like 30 dollars and never had a problem since then...or you can just pickup a sunfire cluster and mess with it. Usually its just the sodier thats messes up after years of abuse.

Hi Everyone!

I just fixed my odometer over the weekend. I still cannot believe people are charging $150 to fix this and/or telling people to only buy a new cluster to fix this issue (like the dealer told me).

I tore mine apart and really it didn't take much time at all. Note: you will have to pull the needles off so you can remove the front plate with all the writing on it. I found it was better to "peek" between the two pieces and gently pry the needle off (I tried pulling with my hands but it was taking serious pressure and I didn't want to break it) with a small straight screw driver to get the needles started. Once I "cracked them loose" they pulled off by hand pretty easily.

I noticed that each "dash illumination bulb" is soldered directly to the back board of the cluster. That will be fun later if any of those burn out. But at least they are NOT buried like the odometer one and the repair will be the same as this repair. The odometer illumination bulb (which is the exact same as the others used in the illumination of the dash, BTW) is unfortunately underneath the LCD display for the mileage. I tested the continuity of the bulb that was in there from the back of the circuit board and got nothing so I knew it was the culprit. I very gently trimmed some of the white plastic housing that holds the LCD display in place. I just barely took enough off so I could GENTLY pry back the LCD display and see the bulb down inside, soldered to the circuit board. Using a small tip soldering iron, I removed the solder from the backside of the bulb and pulled it out with small pliers (tweezers would work too). Went into Radio Shack (Now called The Source by Circuit City for us Canadians) and bought a $2.99 "mini light" from their bulb section that was 12 volt and had the two wire bottom (no socket). Soldered it on and tested. GOOD AS NEW.

So for anyone with this problem, if you take your time and have the patience to use a soldering iron, you can easily fix this problem yourself. I spent 1 hour fixing it and I really took my time.

Thanks to everyone here for all the tips. I am super happy I saved myself $150+ on doing this repair myself.

Craig