jrfarris808

I have a 2002 Jeep Grand Cherokee inline 6 4.0L 4WD with just over 203K miles. The jeep itself runs great. However, some mornings (more often not) when I start the jeep for the first time in the day, the instrument cluster gauge needles move back and forth and all the lights flash on and off. This occurs for about a minute until the jeep begins to warm up. It seems to only happen on colder mornings - when the temperature is below 45 degrees. Since it began happening, the speedometer stopped working. Odometer still tracks miles and cruise control works. Replaced speed censor on jeep. For all the other starts during the day, no flickering of needles and lights, but speedometer does not work at all (all other gauges work fine). Ran codes at Autozone and no codes came back. Conducted instrument cluster check by holding in trip button and turning key to ACC. The check went through okay and no errors messages were displayed; i.e. "No Bus". Any suggestions of what the problem may be and recommendations on course of action to fix it? I was thinking about replacing the instrument cluster with a used/salvaged one for between $50 and $60. Good/bad idea? If I replace, do I need to have it programmed to my vehicle and mileage updated? Thank you for your time and I look forward to your responses.

94zj318

As long as you're not putting a gauge cluster from a Limited/Overland into a Laredo, you should just be able to plug-'n'-play. If you DO swap a cluster from a Limited/Overland into a Laredo, it will still work, however, your mileage will be stuck at whatever the vehicle you took it out of had on it, there's NO way to program a Laredo's mileage into a Limited's/Overland's cluster. Laredo clusters will automatically get the mileage from the Body Control Module (BCM).

-Vince