Four problems related to dashboard failed have been reported for the 2005 GMC Yukon. The most recently reported issues are listed below. Please also check out the statistics and reliability analysis of the 2005 GMC Yukon based on all problems reported for the 2005 Yukon.
At the initial start up and the follow on drive selection of the vehicle, the drive selector indicator on the (speedo) speed cluster fails to light up to be able to see the exact gear the vehicle is in. During low light times the indication is barely visible and day light hours you are unable to see the indication to ensure the proper gear of vehicle which could result in selecting wrong gear.
2005 GMC Yukon xl speedometer reading erratic, now doesn't work at all - needle hangs down past 120 mph. Appears that the stepper motor that drives the speedometer gauge has failed. I believe this has been recalled for model years before 2005, but not for this model year. Dealer says that the entire instrument cluster needs to be replaced.
Starting in November 2007, I have been having problems with my 2005 Yukon speedometer. It would either start at 60mph, not go higher than 45mph, and lately it just failed. It's not registering any speed. On July 25, 2008, I was told by a GMC dealership that my cluster has failed and needing to be replaced. I was also told that these they have seen a lot of these vehicles with the same problem. Supposedly, there was a recall for 2003 and 2005 models having problems with their speedometer.
I started having problems with my speedometer cluster about 1 year after purchase. It worked most of the time so didn't take it in for repair under my warranty. After 3 years it stopped working altogether but I was no longer under warranty. I called the dealer to see if there was a recall and he said there was but I had too many miles on the vehicle to qualify. So I have been driving without a working speedometer for the past two years.