Please someone help. This is the story.

Bought a new market stereo. installed it. i guess something went wrong, and my dashboard lights would not work. smelled some smoke. checked it out. and got under my instrument cluster and into the circuit board. there were some burnt traces. got it to a spot that the lights would turn back on. tried soldering it together. worked - but then my rdm was stuck at one spot. now i cant seem to get any of it to work. might have screwed around with the wire on the circuit board to much. dont know what to do now. i need to drive it tomorrow night! Do i have to go buy a new circuit board? can i take it to a mechanic and could he fix the one connection on the board? please help. i dont have much money either.

-girl who has no idea what she is doing

 

You're probably going to need a new cluster. Luckily, you can pluck one from a junkyard for fairly cheap.

 

Nationwide salvage listings: http://www.car-part.com/

*Make sure you get the exact same instrument cluster (2-door/4-door, DX/LX/EX, auto/manual transmission, side airbags/no side airbags). Also they switched the wiring somewhere midway through 2003. If you have a 2001 it will work with other 2001s, 2002s and some 2003s. While if you have a 2004-2005 it will work with 2005s, 2004s, and some 2003s. If you have a 2003 the new style is LED instead of incandescent.