Since I've owned my accord the temp gauge would go up at random and drop when I hit bumps, so I figured out that if I tap or sometimes hit the dash it would pop up. I've been doing it for years now and it was all good, just recently the speedometer has been affected, probably from all the tapping and hitting (:, but it jumps and sticks and now I have to hit in certain spots on the dash so I can do the temp guage and not the speedometer and vice versa. Does anyone have any idea of what's going on? Other than the obvious hitting and tapping, and what I can do to have my cluster working normal without all the hitting and tapping. Has anyone ever had similar problems or issues with the guages just stopping and dropping or jumping?

 

You can pull the cluster and take it apart. The individual components are removable and have contact points with the main circuit board. You could have some corrosion/scale at those contacts that are press fit that you can clean up with some rubbing alcohol and a q-tip. A pencil eraser is also good at removing slight buildup on the flat contacts. I know there are youtube videos showing how to disassemble the cluster. Just be careful to not mess up the needles on the gauge and absolutely do not remove the needle.

Most likely you have cracked solder joints on the circuit boards for the temp gauge and now the speedometer. If you know how to use a soldering iron, you can reflow the solder joints, or use a solder sucker to remove the old solder, then solder the joints with fresh solder. I like rosin core solder for electronics, because the flux is inside the solder wire.

It is possible that you have a loose female pin in the connector, where you can tighten the pin. You'd need an identical male pin or a piece of metal with about the same thickness to use as a feeler gauge. You do not want to insert something thicker than your pin, because you can spread out the female connector and create another problem.