Most likely one of the microscopic items on the circuit board is failing.

You checked your fsms and have confirmed all the grounds are good?

No, I haven't looked for the rest of the grounds just yet. Today it twitched once and went back to normal, although I think the readings were off. PCM said 180 deg while the dash said 210 and the oil pressure gauge went down to 20 at idle. That better be incorrect.

there is also a ground bus on the pass side identical to the drivers side.

Since you have the FSM, I believe your best route would be the troubleshooting in the electrical section and checking the schematics for all the possible grounds for the dash. Otherwise..we are shooting in the dark at where they might be or what might be causing the problem.

Well, the FSM points toward G202 and G203, grounds near the ground busses by the front doors. And they are both common to the Illuminated Entry that isn't working either.

J I'm having the same problem with the cluster. I took out the ground buss and cleaned it but nothing happened. (the ground buss was clean anyways...) And right now I'm acquiring another gauge cluster. Boosty was thinkin something is bad in teh cluster so I figured I've have nothing to lose changing them out.... Except the $25 I will be paying for it :? I'll report back when/if it happens...

Cleaned the grounds and it didn't help.

Double check your battery cables and connections. Your interior lighting issue has me wondering.

I cleaned them all when I did the engine swap. I'll look them over again though after work.

Did you remove the boots?

(If we don't come up with something soon...we'll have to call it white curse)