So I just bought a 91 GTA a couple months back and the odometer was intermittently working on it. I've read that the gears can get old and break so I bought a donor gauge cluster to swap everything out.

I got mine disassembled and sure enough, the teeth on the gears were stripped so I swapped the new ones in and reassembled everything. Went for a short drive and still no functioning odometer. I could hear a loud ticking noise which I thought might be the motor. I noticed that the motor from my original cluster was quite easy to turn and had some in/out shaft play. The one from the donor cluster was much tighter. Not knowing how the motor should feel, I reused my original the first time. So after that quick drive, I disassembled everything again and this time swapped the motor out. Put everything back together and went for a drive. Still no functioning odometer. I can still hear a ticking noise but it's not nearly as pronounced as before.

I'm really stumped and not sure what direction to go at this point. Has anyone else had a similar issue or have any clue what might be the problem here?

 

Just a quick update to provide some addition info. I drove the car around a little bit the last couple of days and both times the odometer would not work at first. After a period of time, it did appear to be working and operating properly. I'm not sure what's causing the slow start. Any ideas?

I also drove it to work this morning (about 20-25 min drive) and it didn't work the entire time.