# My guages don't work **URL:** \ **Category:** Maintenance/Repairs\ **Created:** [January 15, 2008, 5:31am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/my-guages-dont-work/9443 "2008-01-15T05:31:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![luke\_pennington](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8edcca/32.png) [@luke\_pennington](https://community.cartalk.com/u/luke_pennington)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2008, 5:31am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/my-guages-dont-work/9443/1 "2008-01-15T05:31:52Z")
Why do the guages on my 1995 Neon only work intermittently? ---
**Author:** ![luke\_pennington](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8edcca/32.png) [@luke\_pennington](https://community.cartalk.com/u/luke_pennington)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2008, 6:03am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/my-guages-dont-work/9443/2 "2008-01-15T06:03:09Z")
It is probably a bad connection inside the guage cluster. You could get one from a salvage yard, but it won’t be cheap. Call you’re local used parts dealer and ask for the price. ---
**Author:** ![Craig58](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3da27b/32.png) [@Craig58](https://community.cartalk.com/u/Craig58)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2008, 6:07am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/my-guages-dont-work/9443/3 "2008-01-15T06:07:19Z")
LOL, hate to interrupt; but have you checked the ground connection from the cluster. I ended up running a separate ground on one of my cars. ---
**Author:** ![luke\_pennington](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8edcca/32.png) [@luke\_pennington](https://community.cartalk.com/u/luke_pennington)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2008, 6:16am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/my-guages-dont-work/9443/4 "2008-01-15T06:16:15Z")
I have not checked the ground yet. I cleaned all the connections on the bulkhead plugs, but it didn’t help. I haven’t done much because they work about 40% of the time. I was just hoping that this was a common problem that someone would know an easy fix for. It could be a bad ground. I have a chilton manual. I guess I could figure out which one is ground. It used to be mainly the speedo. that didn’t work. Now all 3, speed , temp., and fuel don’t work. Do you remember how you fixed it? ---
**Author:** ![Craig58](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3da27b/32.png) [@Craig58](https://community.cartalk.com/u/Craig58)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2008, 6:22am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/my-guages-dont-work/9443/5 "2008-01-15T06:22:26Z")
My car is an old benz that had “jumpy” gauges. i simply ran a wire from a metal portion of the instrument cluster to a ground point under the dash. Apparently their was a bad internal ground someplace. I knew it was a common problem because all the instruments were jumping “together” and I assumed it was a ground issue. ---
**Author:** ![luke\_pennington](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8edcca/32.png) [@luke\_pennington](https://community.cartalk.com/u/luke_pennington)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2008, 6:39am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/my-guages-dont-work/9443/6 "2008-01-15T06:39:51Z")
Hi Craig. Ya, my speedometer jumps sometimes. But they don’t all jump at once. I wish. I’ll look into it closer now that I know I am not the only person with this very annoying problem. It is very annoying to have jumping guages isn’t it? It makes me want to drive the car off of a cliff. My main problem is the fuel guage. Not knowing how much fuel I have is frustrating. I wish my tank had a factory equipped dipsick in the fuel tank so I could just check it before I drove. The old Caterpillar bulldozers had these and I think it was a very good idea. ---
**Author:** ![Cougar](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/cartalk/user_avatar/community.cartalk.com/cougar/32/21348_2.png) [@Cougar](https://community.cartalk.com/u/Cougar)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2008, 6:42am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/my-guages-dont-work/9443/7 "2008-01-15T06:42:20Z")
I suggest you check the power to the gauges also, using a meter. ---
**Author:** ![luke\_pennington](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8edcca/32.png) [@luke\_pennington](https://community.cartalk.com/u/luke_pennington)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2008, 6:49am UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/my-guages-dont-work/9443/8 "2008-01-15T06:49:48Z")
OK. I’m going to check power and ground! Maybe I’ll even change the oil if I can get the stupid guages to work. I really don’t know how many miles it has been because the stupid odometer doesn’t work most of the time either. Thank you for the help. ---
**Author:** ![Craig58](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3da27b/32.png) [@Craig58](https://community.cartalk.com/u/Craig58)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2008, 1:43pm UTC](https://community.cartalk.com/t/my-guages-dont-work/9443/9 "2008-01-15T13:43:57Z")
You can always just reset your odometer when you fill-up, than you have some idea how much fuel you have left. Works on my motorcycle.