1999 Dodge Durango, 5.9, 4x4, 6'1, 260 pound, white-german male, does not like walks on the beach, long talks, nor can I comment on dresses, make-up, jewely.


Besides all that, my Durango had a real hard time in the morning (only in the winter) to a. start and b. stay running without me having to keep my foot on the gas.

Checking these forums I saw a video of someone doing whatever with the Idle Air Control Valve to which Hydra left a lengthy response which made more sense than the original post (again).

Took the air intake off, removed the valve and man was it dirty.
Used cleaner on the valve and the air intake and that thing with those two flaps that let air into the engine (pfff...I suck with names but am good at pointing and saying 'That thing').

Now, a couple of days ago before I did the cleaning my car absolutely did not want to start or stay running. I started it and floored the gas pedal until it 'bam' came on but was running extremely rough. I saw a big white cloud behind my vehicle to which my co-workers responded with 'Ooohh!'s and 'Aaaah!'s...like it was some firework-show.

Aaanyways...now the car, when running, idles ... but very rough. It will stay on and all but it has a noticable vibration.

Is it possible that a spark-plug is bad? Should the distributor cap be taken off and checked for dirt?

The rough running started AFTER I 'forced' the car to start.

Appreciate you time. Just want to see if I am on the right track of investigating the source.

 

All sparkplugs replaced. I read somewhere that the gap should be around .40. Correctly gapped and installed 8 new plugs. The old plugs were so work, it wasn't funny. The gapping on the old plugs was up to .80, they were worn and old. I don't think they had been changed in a loooong time.
So, again started the car and the rough running continues. No check engine lights on.
You can feel it vibrate pretty good. No misfires, no stalling.

Will take distributor cap off next and check for anything.

Question now: Is it possible for the timing to be off ?
And how do you check?


Thanks in advance!

 

After a late night drive the car didn't want to start this morning again...as it did before. This time the Check Engine light stayed on though.
Autozone checked and code resulted in either a vacuum problem, an IAC-Valve issue or dirty air intake. Air intake was cleaned, bought a new IAC-Valve ($30). Installed Valve, cleaned distributor Cap while I was at it.
I did reset the Check Engine light (Negative Cable off, turn key to start for around 15 seconds). Car starts, check engine light is off BUT IT STILL idles and runs rough. It accelerates just fine (better than before) but you definitely can notice a vibration throughout the vehicle at any speed.

Will do one more thing today, check spark-plug wires (use and spark plug in each wire, one by one)

Now what?

 

If the plugs were that bad, I'd venture to say the dist cap, rotor and plug wires are just as bad. Somethings you can clean and get good results and somethings just plain wear out. Time to invest a few $$$ and replace the dist cap and rotor with a good quality brass terminal set and a new set of plug wires. A tune up and preventative maintenance is your best friend,

 

a bad battery or dirty/corroded battery terminals can cause many problems ranging from needing to keep giving it gas to keep it from stalling to completely refusing to start or make all of the electrics stop working. (they usually get worse in the winter)

check to make sure the terminals are clean, free of corrosion, and tight on the posts. you may also want to have the battery load tested.

 

The Dist cap and it's contact points had a good amount of white residue. Shaved em off, cleaned as good as possible. Same with the rotor BUT...as the plugs MUST have been in there since the day the car was build, I can imagine that more work is needed.

Will update and look again for advise. Having a Durango is good. Having a Durango and a forum such as this for backup is better.


Thanks all.

 

When you changed the plugs what plugs did you use?? our rigs like the cheapo champion copper plugs, while some have had good results with other plugs in my experiance everything but the champions ran like crap in my rig....


Even though you may have clean the cap and rotor pretty good i would advise to replace it anyways along with a decent set of 8.5mm wires. I'd also just for giggles replace the TPS, when i replaced mine my trucks became so much smoother.


If memory serves me right, the timing is set by the PCM and can't be adjusted.

 

I'm not positive about the 4.7 but the 5.2 and 5.9 have a chain driven camshaft so unless the chain stretched (which is very very unlikely) the timing should be fine.

and I do believe the pcm does controls the timing advance old_school

 

Did you clean the throttle body? Also, when was the last time you replaced the air filter? Check for vacuum leaks too. Start simple...

 

+1 on keeping it simple