QuestionI have a 1997 Sebring Convertible, My RPM gauge and mileage only comes on from time to time. I scrolled through previous questions and found where someones odometer didn't work constantly and read YOur answer so I went out and checked. I took off the two screws under the steering wheel close to floor and there didn't apear to be any close to the column itself so I couldn't get the under dash piece off completely to investigate the wires to cluster. How do I get that part off to check this and how likely is it that it would be the plug or wires when it comes on it could stay on for hours if I was to be driving for hours but once car gets turned off it goes off and might not come back on for days.I guess what are the steps to getting to the cluster itself to check for a problem? and would another cluster out of a 97 sebring non conv. fit it the same? Thanks for Your time!
AnswerHi Linda,
If I understand correctly, your speedometer always works but not the odometer and tachometer which are intermittant and always on or off simultaneously, correct? Let me know if this is not the case.
My difficulty is that so far I only have been able to acquire a '95 Sebring shop manual which was the first year of that model. The part about the combination meters is devoid of any mention of the odometer as a separate functioning unit from the speedo. And confounding the issue is that the circuit diagrams for the dash are quite complex as is the harness wirings. I am afraid that without a later manual, ideally a '97 for the Sebring convertible, and pages that both of us can view, I am only going to confuse things and take a lot of your time and mine. About the only thing I can suggest could cause both the tach and the speedo (and maybe only the odometer but I don't see that mentioned as a separate unit) to go out at the same time is that the current return to the negative pole of the battery (so-called ground return wire) behind the cluster is loose at its attachment point. Such a 'common' failure leads one to identify a wire that affects both units. Although it will probably look like a rat's nest, I would get myself inverted under the dash and see if I could look up into the area just behind the cluster to find a black wire that seems to be associated with the cluster and whose far end is connected by a screw or a bolt to a solid piece of structural metal in that same vicinity. If that were loose, then that would interrupt both the tach and the speedo in a '95 Sebring, and so it might do the same in your '97.
Sorry to not be more specific but I only recently got this '95 manual and it is very different from the manuals for earlier and other car lines and somewhat frustrating (no index as such for example, and no system by system organization as in all the earlier manuals).
So I would not rely on my advice given for other models to apply to the Sebring.
Let me know if you find anything interesting or have other questions. I admit to not being familiar with the Sebring though it nominally replaced the LeBaron of which I own an '89 and am quite familiar with.
Best wishes and happy New Year.
Roland
