Pontiac Repair: 02 Pntiac grand am, fuse boxes, pntiac

Question
I was looking at my grandmas 02 grand am because she had
recently experienced the Inst Panel and gauges losing power while driving down the road. This has happened twice to her in the last couple of weeks. The vehicle only has 28000 miles on it. I have driven it and couldn't duplicate her concern. However, I let it sit for three hours in the cold and when I went to start it, the engine kicked over like normal, but nothing was working on the IP, the radio didn't work, and blower. I turned it to acc and found some of the warning lights would come on. I cycled the key on and off and occasionally I would get power in the start position, but lose the power when turning the key to crank it. I continued to cycle the key until I finally
received all power. At first I thought maybe it was water leaking onto a module because it sat in the snow, but the other occurences was dry. I'm thinking a ignition switch, but any advice you can share would be great.   Dennis

Answer
Hey Dennis:

Good guess Yup from the sounds of it it is a bad ignition switch. The contacts have high resistance in them and it's not allowing the fuse boxes to either power up at all or not puwer up fully. With all the computer modules in these cars if they don't have full battery voltage they do all kinds of wierd things. I would alos  have the battery checked especially if it's the original battery. Places like auto zone and advance auto will check it for you for free.. Lastly get an original equipment switch any chevy or pontiac dealer will have it in stock it's a pretty common failure. Do not get an aftermarket one you'll be sorry! Good luck :}