Good afternoon Redwing.
I do not have any advice for you at this time, but I am working on a similar problem. I posted a question on the forum about a month ago with my truck, and many replies were posted. I have been testing some of the suggestions, and wish to thank the guys who have replied. As we get to the bottom of this problem I will also post anything we have found, and thank those who have given support.

Our problem was the truck would just stall while I was going down the road. After a few minutes the truck would start and run fine. We thought maybe it is a fuel problem. This week it has not been starting good, and with more testing we found it is spark. The following is a brief overview.

We do know the spark is yellow and weak. Most times the truck will run. If it stalls it starts up again. I replaced the fuel filter first. Then I replaced the fuel pump/oil pressure module. Later on it would not start up properly. That is when I narrowed it down to an electrical problem. I put in new cap and rotor, plugs and plug wires. Just regular maintenance stuff. One of the suggestions from before was the pick-up coil. I did not replace this yet. I was hoping it was just a bad cap. Before starting we tested for spark and found we didn't have any. We wiggled wires around in the harness bundles and later found we had spark. Today we started it up wiggled wires looking for a short; it kept running when we accelerated to increase RPM the truck died. We found it was absent of spark; Waited a few minutes and it had spark and started.

I feel we have a very similar problem. This is an old farm truck and I don't have much time or expertise to work on the truck. My dad and his friend are retired and they like these projects if you have any information let us know. Thanks and good luck.

 

Seems you fellers up north have a lot more trouble with the TBI setup. I guess the cold and road salt plays hell with 'em. My Dad's '90 has well over 200,000 on it,never misses a beat. Still gets 17 mpg. Even has the factory cap and wires. My '86 Ramcharger has '88 TBI, untold mileage came off a good running $200 turd I bought, been stone dependable. Been several guys on here with computer failures from up north.

 

Good morning I want to thank all of you guys for your useful suggestions. I’ll be pulling the distributor today and replacing the pick-up coil. Lugnuts could you please explain what TBI is? After twenty five years in the military I still never went to TLA training. (Three Letter Acronym)

 

Throttle Body Injection. Has two fuel injectors mounted above the throttle blades. Was one step above the computer controlled feedback carbs of the 80's. Sequential Multi Port FI is much more accurate,with an injector in each intake runner.
Heard rumors of an oxygen sensor for each cylinder in the works. Allows individual mixture control of each cylinder. Sounds OK on paper but I wouldn't want to work on it. Enough crap to go haywire as it is.

 

and the friggen 02 sensors go all the time. Imagine replacing 8 of those things? 800 bucks or more!

by the way, im a northern driver with a similar issue. It cuts out on the highway, and then runs just fine in 10 minutes. Im convinced its a bad connection or something along those namby pamby lines. So convinced, that im not even going to bother trying to fix it

 

I see that others have similar problems. I gave up and eliminated the computer for the most part. Mr. gasket makes some nifty parts. That old Coachman motorhome came in handy for the Quadra-junk carb sitting on top of what used to be a TBI intake. When spring comes I'll do it right... maybe. lol For now it works cuz I'll be able to plow the driveway again. Good luck with your truck daughetry. When these old Dodge's run right, you can't get a better truck.

 

you ripped out all the electrical and went carb?

 

Yup Nemesis, I removed the TBI and distributor and put in a point distributor for a '73 318 and used a Mr. Gasket 2bbl to 4bbl adaptor and put on a Quadra-jet from a '77 Coachman with a 454. Not quite done with all the minor stuff yet but so far it's going good. I had to drill and tap new holes for the adaptor cuz the TBI has an offset bolt pattern. I'm planning in the spring on installing an Edelbrock Performer intake and either a Holley or Carter 4bbl.

 

ive thought about that to eliminate my stalling issue. how hard/expensive was the point distributor?

 

Sorry Nemesis, haven't been in the fourms lately. It's pretty easy to swap out the distributor, It's the other thing's that can be a headache. I bought the point distributor at Advance Auto for about $35 with a $15 core. If you have TBI, you'll have to figure out how to re-route all the vacuum lines that are needed, like the vacuum advance on the point distributor. You're also going to have to set up some kind of fuel return system so as not to over pressurize the carb. I used a 5/16 brass T-connector and a needle valve. You also have to wire the fuel pump on the TBI system to run non-stop. I'm still not done yet. I threw my back out about a week ago and haven't done much to it since.