Hi, 2003 dodge caravan sport 3.3 flex fuel. Here's what's happening every so often when I start the vehicle all the instrument gages don't work(speedometer, water temp, fuel gage) and all the duty lights come on except the voltage lights, the drive shift lights all light up, also along with this the a/c won't work but the fans do, the headlights come on and won't turn off and the wipers do not work. Then after awhile all goes away and is normal but leaves an engine code p1698 no bus input from tranmision control module, but no issues with the drive train so I really don't thing it's the Tcm? Also while this is happening the obd2 reader errors out when trying to read. Anyone encounter this or any ideas, I've been reading that it could be a bad solder on instrument cluster or mayber a bcm. Thanks for any input.

 

It could also be a bit of corrosion on a connector. You might try removing the cluster and disconnecting the instrument cluster multi-pin connector and reconnecting it a couple times. If it's a corrosion or bad connection issue, that should clean it up. Be VERY careful not to stress the plastic dash parts, they get brittle with exposure to sunlight and if you break the one that the cluster hangs from, you'll create a problem that you don't want to deal with!
You don't say what position the needles on the gauges are in when they don't work. I had an issue with the needles maxing out on all the gauges, and I found the solution in this forum. There's a specific sequence to follow to reset the zero point on the gauges, something like pressing the odometer reset while turning the key to the on position, but I don't recall it right now. If that's your issue, look around, the procedure's on here somewhere.

Hope this helps