99 Malibu - Possible short in dash?

[dlacourse]

Lately, when I turn the key in the morning, nothing happens. I have to turn the key back and forth a few times and it will eventually start. Once it is warmed up, it starts fine. (Bad bushings on the starter?) When this happens, the trip meter (The digital one that can be toggled to the odometer/trip meter with the button on the instrument cluster) resets to 0. The clock and radio presets are fine, so this seems to be isolated to just the dash board. About the same time this started happening, I noticed that my headlights and instrument cluster lights flicker when I tap the brakes. It seems to be intermittent - one night they will flicker, and then it won't happen for a week or two. I would have suspected the starter or the starter cable if it was just the starting issue, but these flickering lights have me a little worried. I'm not afraid to tear into the starter, but the dash board wiring scares the hell out of me. The only other electrical problem I seem to have is the heat/air conditioning issue, where my fan will not blow when the dial is set to 1 or 2, but I don't think they are related. Has anyone else seen this problem?

[garync1]

When i notice some strange things happen to my 98 I thought it was some bad electrical problem.. Turn out the battery cable on the posative side had a heck of alot of crud buried under the red plastic so much a had to cut off the plastic to get it cleaned and found out that big red plastic cover hold a thin coper connection. like a big washer except almost paper thin. After cleaning and reconection all my worries went away. As for the heat/AC blower there is a part you can get from car quest for about 20.00 bucks to solve that problem. I have to look it up again because I need to replace mine,it only works from 3 up. If you do clean your batt cable make sure you remove the negative side first or your instument cluster neddles will jump under the stop pegs and you will have to dig in the dash for that..Not all that hard just anoying..When putting batt cables on put pos first then neg. Hope this helps.