Speedo and tach shutting off

[geetus]

Lately my 96 Golf TD has been losing its speedometer and tachometer readings. The strange thing is that it usually only happens after the car has been warmed up then driven and shut off then restarted shortly after. For example when I drive to get fuel, and restart the car after filling up the gauges are at zero. But If I drive for an indefinate period of time they contiue working until the ignition is turned off. Once though, I started the car up in the morning and the gauges were at zero immediately, but after a few minutes of driving they sprang to life!
All other gauges still work as well as the odometer and I can still get a tach reading from the diagnostic menu on the LCD readout on the odometer display.
Anyone have this happen to them or Know what might be causing this?
I have checked some of the ground points, but I am unsure where most are located.
Cheers, Ryan.

[burn_your_money]

This happened to my friends 95 golf. If he pulled the e brake up one notch everything worked well for a while but eventually that stopped working

[geetus]

It is kind of frustrating not knowing the exact cause of the problem because it is so inconsistant.
Couple of days ago I was driving around while the tach and speedo had shut off earlier that day, when i stoped and came back a half hour later started the car up and the gauges were back again. So I drove to a store five minutes away, went in, came out and when I restarted the car the gauges were dead again.
Frustrating!

[Baselyne]

someones going to tell you to get a Bentley and follow the wires...

mainly it sounds like a wire or two have crossed paths and the casing bured off so there shorting out somewhere between the panel and the cluster....Not so hard,

To me finding the trouble between the fuse and the elements in the engine can be alittle more tricky as you loose sight on them while following them as they come to the firewall!

Your going to need a multimeter with an continity tester... Volts meter to see voltage drops and you should be good to go testing...

Sounds like a bad ground, loose connection behind the stearing coloum! See if when you pull the wires going to the cluster lightly does it come on an off freak-wnt-ly? is your windshield leaking....I doubt it its 1996 but just a thought!
Good luck

[95gltd]

the first mexican generation all have problems.
Examples

my 95 golf every once and awhile you will hear a zzz in the column and a little bit of smoke come out. My brothers 93 gas jetta does the same thing. Mine the windshield wipers would come on by themselves and then not be able to shut them off. The dash lights going on and off randomly. I've already changed 1 complete cluster because none of the guages would work. Brothers jetta the cluster has gone south too. Only thing that works is the tach. The gas guage varies ALOT. The temp guage only reads about 1/2 what the actual temperature is.

Get this if i put fuel in while the car is running it doese not register on the guage. If it had 1/4 it stays there. Takes about 2 days before it registers correctly. If i shut off the key before fulling no problem. Guage goes right to where it should be.


There 93-97 VM's are real gremlins when it comes to the wiring/guages.

I've learned to live with it.