Hi,

I have a 2014 Nissan Sentra with a gauge cluster that has a slightly failing screen. I decided that I am going to replace it myself, and I started doing some searching on eBay and came across the gauge cluster on the 2016+ Sentras that looks like this: https://autonxt.net/wp-content/uploads/ ... ntra34.jpg

It looks a lot nicer than the one on my current car which looks like this: https://cars.usnews.com/static/images/A ... luster.jpg

Since the 2016 Sentras and the 2014 are extremely similar (they essentially have the same interior with just some small updates) I knew the new gauge cluster would fit in place of the old one, but I wasn't sure if it was going to be plug and play. They have the same connectors it seems, the only difference being that the 2016 has an extra connection for the cluster. But I did some research and found out that the extra connection is only used for transmitting radio data to the new cluster, and also radars since some newer Sentras have collision warning. Basically the extra connector isn't a necessity to hook up, and both clusters have the same connector for main functions.

So I bought a 2016 Gauge cluster to try it out myself. I am going to have the cluster programmed so that it will match the mileage that my car has, but since I have the cluster now I decided before I get it programmed, I would plug it in to my car and see what happens. Upon plugging it in, my car did some weird things. When I put the car in accessory, the gauge cluster did nothing at all, but everything else was working (radio, ac, etc). When I went to start my car, it would not start at all. Oddly enough, when I tried to start It, the radiator fan would kick on but nothing else would happen. So I removed it and put the old cluster back in and my car started fine and everything worked again. I do however have a check engine light that came on, but I assume it can probably be cleared because it was just unhappy with the other cluster.

Now my question is, is the reason why the 2016 cluster didn't work because the mileage on the cluster I tried was very different from the milage that my car is at? The 2016 cluster I bought is at 14k miles and my car is at 92k. If I program this new cluster to have the correct mileage, will it work with my car? Or is the issue bigger, and the connections on both of the clusters don't match so therefore it will not be possible to swap them unless I do some wiring changes? I was pretty confident they would be fairly similar in wiring, because the 2016 Sentra has 2 models, one with the newer cluster that I am trying to swap into my car, but some of the base 2016 models have the same cluster present in my car, so I thought Nissan probably wouldn't go through the trouble of changing up the wiring harness on 2 different models of car, but maybe I'm wrong. Any suggestions?

Your last paragraph is accurate. What it "looks like" is irrelevant. Not only is the cluster specific to your ECU and your particular car, but 2 years in modern cars is a LONG time. Much has changed. Add to that the Federal safeguards that prevent cluster swapping and you're gonna get nowhere ("reprogramming" the mileage is the east of your concerns).

Basically, even though you think the connectors are the same, it's a CAN-BUS wiring system. It's not a 70's car, where each wire has only one function. Bottom line, you'll waste more time trying to figure it out than it's worth. Trust me, I went down this road with a 2009 Cube... the HVAC, airbags, audio, etc all route through the cluster. It's maddening.

Replace the failing screen and be done.

I researched this for someone on another site. The type A cluster wiring from the '14 is positively incompatible with the type B (larger graphic display) used on some '16's. Plugging it in will crash the CANbus.

PS - Any type A cluster from a '16 will cross over, although some features like outside temperature may not work right.