1993 Dodge Dakota LE, 5.2L, 175,000 miles (original owner)

Last night got in truck. Fired right up. Ran for 5 seconds perfectly fine and it suddenly quit. I cannot get it to start again. Nice healthy crank but wont fire up. Tried again this morning and same thing. Healthy crank but no start. I can hear the fuel pump come on when I bump the key (new fuel pump installed a year ago). New fuel filter six months ago. Did a Check Engine code read and there are no codes. Looked for obvious stuff like loose/disconnected wires, cannot see anything. Have problems on occasion (maybe once a year) with car conking out and trouble restarting in the past. Replaced camshaft sensor and crankshaft sensor a half year ago. It did sputter once a few months ago as I was merrily going down the highway at 55 but recovered 10 seconds later on its own.

Any ideas, fellas? Thanks!

 

1993? Splice by the windshield washer tank; take the tape apart and examine the splice for green rot or a bad wire.

Since the fuel pump kicks on, the signal to the ASD is good; but the fuel pump relay is run in parallel to the ASD, so there's always a chance the ASD relay itself is conking out. Try swapping the two relays (ASD and fuel pump), and see what happens.

If it comes back by swapping the relays, replace BOTH.

RwP

 

Good idea but i'd make sure if it's electrical or fuel related. Remove the air intake off the throttle body and shoot some starting fluid into it. If it runs then dies, your fuel isn't working and the relay may be the culprit. If it still doesn't start, your problem is electrical in the ignition system.

 

ASD?

For the record, I put in a new fuel pump relay in several months ago just because. And just this morning I also swapped the AC Clutch relay with the fuel pump relay cuz I know they're the same relay. Didn't make any difference.

What is the ASD?

UPDATE: Oh, I got it. The Auto Shutdown relay. Sorry!

 

Good idea. Unfortunately I do not have any starting fluid at the moment. I'm fairly certain it is electrical because I've had problems over the last five years or so with the engine suddenly without warning just sputtering and/or conking out. This has happened once or twice a year. Sometimes I can fire it back up right away, sometimes it will fire up 20 minutes later.

 

You can dribble gasoline down the throat. I don't like to do this because I have a friend who tried to help a guy start a car and didn't know he had poured a quart of gasoline down the carburetor and it backfired, blowing flaming gasoline over his face and hands. Starting fluid will usually just burn your eyebrows off giving you a surprised look until they grow back.

 

I swapped the AC Clutch relay with the ASD relay. No go.

 

As a rule I hate using starting fluid. But sometimes it cannot be avoided.

 

Since the fuel pump relay is new, and you hear the pump priming, I'd swap the ASD with the FUEL PUMP, not the AC clutch, relay; we've got a fairly-sure-it's-good relay there.

One more thing - even if the pump makes sound, it might not be pumping; I'd use a fuel pressure gauge and see what the fuel pressure is when trying to start, in case it's a fuel supply problem.

Next step is to NOID at least one injector and watch it while cranking to see if we're getting injector pulses. If we've got fuel pressure and injector pulses, we should have fuel.

If we're missing ONE of those two, we have some idea where the problem may be.

I'd not worry about the crankm sensor right now; it's used to tell the ECU that we're spinning, and with it missing, you won't get any pump action past the initial prime of about 2 seconds. If you can hear the pump running while cranking, that is probably in good shape.

And if you hear the pump running and the NOID light flashes on the injector you're testing, I can say both crank and cam sensors are probably good.

(If, however, you DON'T hear the pump running, and there's no fuel pressure while cranking, then you may have a bad crank sensor ... )

RwP

 

OK Ralph, the truck started. This is what I did.

1) With all the relays back in their original position, I swapped the Fuel Pump relay with the ASD relay. Truck would not start.
2) From there, I swapped the AC Clutch relay with the Fuel Pump relay and the truck started.

Final configuration:
The Fuel Pump relay ended up on the ASD
The ASD relay ended up on the AC Clutch
The AC Clutch relay ended up on the Fuel Pump

GO FREAKING FIGURE!!!!!

There is something very mysterious going on and I'll be danged if I can figure it out. I guess the next step is to get all new relays. All three of them. See what happens!