I know this horse has already been beat enough but here we go, recently I purchased a 1997 dodge dakota slt 4x4. I love my little dakota until it started misfiring bad and cutting off while going down the road... So far I've changed distributor cap, rotor button, wires, plugs, new alternator, IAC sensor, throttle body position sensor. No luck with any of it and I'm stumped. Anyone know what it could be? Or had a similar situation, this is my only vehicle so I'm screwed until I get this figured out. Also I thought about just doing a 5.2l 318 swap if I can't get this v6 going right again.

 

Crank or cam sensor. Any codes??

 

Have you tried changing the Crank Position Sensor? It controls the spark timing and often causes misfires, stumbling, and stalling. If there's an intermittent signal, the PCM cuts the power to the ignition coil. It's located on the bellhousing on the passenger side, remove the passenger front tire and splash guard. It's right behind the back of the exhaust manifold and is held on with 2 1/2 inch bolts. Our trucks don't really like 3rd party sensors, so getting a genuine mopar one is recommended. The other sensor to replace (and a little easier) is the cam position sensor (also called ignition pickup), it tells the PCM the distributor location for fuel sync. It's located under the distributor cap and rotor, it's a plastic plate with a 3-wire harness.

Both of these sensors are hall effect sensors and have a life-cycle, or they can be covered in metal shavings, rust, etc which affect their readings. They can go out or act bad without throwing a code, they generally only throw a code if they die completely.

 

Only code I get as of now is misfire on cylinder 5. But I checked spark and fuel. Someone told me maybe an o2 sensor? How do I check the crank and cam sensors?

 

Need an oscilloscope....

 

Would it be okay if I just went and replaced both the crank and cam position sensors and see if that does it?

 

One way to do it. Use genuine mopar sensors though. The pcm doesn't always play nice with the aftermarket fellers.

 

How's the plenum gasket?

 

DRUM ROLL!
P0300
P0303
P0305
P0351

I bought a code reader and it's saying I got 2 misfired and ignition coil 1 primary circuit malfunction... I'm gonna look through my Chilton book and see what I need to start looking into. Anyone got any good advice?

 

P0300 Multiple Cylinder Misfire
P0303 Cylinder #3 Misfire
P0305 Cylinder #5 Misfire
P0351 Ignition Coil # 1 Primary Circuit

Test the ignition coil, resistance test between the terminals. Not sure if the info is in the chilton but it is in the factory manual. Also check out the wiring going to the coil.