1997 Grand Cherokee Instrument Panel Randomly Shuts Off

[Matt Trostel]

I've recently been experiencing a problem with my 97 Grand Cherokee.
While driving, the instrument panel, along with the interior lights, will go completely dead, then turn back on. This happens intermittently every 5 minutes or so.

I've also been experiencing a similar issue where the instrument panel lights will remain on, but the gauge needles will suddlenly go dead. Within several seconds, the gauges come back to life and things are fine.

Has anyone seen this before and know of a way to fix it?

[mdavis123]

I had this problem on my 99. It was a loose/dirty battery terminal.

[cbftbl87]

check the fuse socket, the fuse may be lose

[Matt Trostel]

I ended up pinpointing the problem to a bad connection on the connector on the back of the instrument cluster.
After going to a junkyard and swapping out the instrument cluster with a used one to rule out a dead circuit board, all I needed to do was take a q-tip with some rubbing alcohol and cleaned out the male connector on the male connector of the instrument cluster.

[jeepfixitman]

Two very common causes, one low voltage corrosion on the pin contacts, clean with electrical contact cleaner, coat pins with di-electric grease. second when the gauges go dead notice if you lose other functions(a/c, seats, etc.) , a sign the network is going down causing a loss of input to the cluster

[Dsilver]

If you can't get it try talking to Dale Aeppli.