Gauges Issue

[koalabear89]

2002 Pontiac Sunfire
About 3 months ago maybe, my gas gauge went crazy. It decided to flip the complete wrong way onto the speedometer area, show no gas, show overfull gas, everything but the correct amount.
So since I am currently a broke college student, i decided to put off finding out what is wrong with it until I can get a job since it was nothing to important. i have been using the mileage and that has worked fine.
It has been pretty much wrong since that time, but seems normal at random points of driving.
then today as of 12:45 am on a particularly colder than normal month here in phoenix I start my car and drive less than a quarter mile when i notice my speedometer has not moved at all! so i stopped, turned the car off, then back on and nothing changed. gas gauge and speedometer are now both on the fritz.
well i have to get home somehow, so i download a good speedometer app and drive pretty darn slow all the way home.
after driving 15-20 minutes maybe, with the heater full on cuse its so cold. the speedometer decides to start working! wonderful.
But since I do not want to drive with a malfunctioning speedometer, does anyone know what might be the issue? hopefully it is a cheap and easy fix!
thanks for the help.
also, i have no idea if this may be an issue, but im about 1500 miles over an oil change, i know this is horrible but again, im broke. I plan on going soon to get it changed.

 

[melsg5]

do you have a check engine light on? The speedo could be the VSS, vehicle speed sensor, or the gauge itself. The gas gauge is probably the small motor in the gauge failing.

 

[koalabear89]

no the check engine light is not on.
so then the two gauge malfunctioning have nothing to do with one another? they are probably two different issues?

 

[melsg5]

over the internet you can only get guesses based upon the available information so unless your gas gauge all of sudden started working at the same time the speedometer started working they probably are unrelated. One problem is caused by a sensor located on the transmission and the other a dash issue.

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[koalabear89]

alright. thanks for the help. i hope its a simple fix. ill be taking it to get an oil change tomorrow so ill have the mechanic check it out too.

 

[sunfire2door]

I'm putting my money on a malfunctioning instrument cluster.... probably yours needs replacing as my gas, tach, and heat gauge malfunctioned and the only way to fix it was to change the cluster...commom problem on the sunfires.

 

[koalabear89]

yeah, thats what my mechanic said. its weird because the speedometer only malfunctions when its really cold in the AM.

 

[sunfire2door]

if your going to replace the cluster then go to a junk yard and get a working one as the one at the dealer costs too much $$$

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