My name's Daniel. I have a 97 V8 1500 Ram. I'll do more of an introduction later, so on to the problem.....

The check engine light blinks on and off constantly(started when it felt almost like the car was outta gas). It sounded like it was almost running out of gas while I wasdriving about 55mph. It did the little shaking back and forth deal and thenit cut off on me. After about 10hrs went back to the truck and it started and drove but still sounded rough(almost like backfiring). Got it to the auto parts store, put it on the tester for codes and the tester said cylinders 1,3,5 were bad. Replaced all spark plugs and retested with the same results. Then I replaced all the plug wires. It drove fine until it got hot/warm then it cut off like it did before. Replaced the coil. Got it to crank but it was running like crap so I parked it. I still have to replace the distributor cap and the modulator with it. Now when I just start it up it sounds like the engine is grinding/screaming and sounds like its gonna blow. I really need to try to get this fixed asap but am pretty much out of ideas on what to fix/repair on it and was wondering if anyone could share some ideas.

Recently before this the oxygen sensor was replaced. Don't know if this will help out at all but thought it might be important in ruling out certain things, but I could be wrong lol.

Thanks for all your help in advance.....

 

[ol][*]Have you tried resetting the PCM (take your negative off the battery and turn your key to the on position for 30 seconds or so)[*]Have you replaced the cap and rotor (I see you bought it but didn't replace it yet)[*]It could be fuel pump going out[/ol]
Try these things and I am sure more will chime in

 

what exactly does resetting your pcm do?

 

Ok, here's the newest update on the hunk of junk lol...... I changed out the distributor cap finally and the gasket that goes between the air filter and the throttle body..... Haven't reset the PCM yet..... It worked great for a while, then took it on the 45min drive back to the house and it cut off on me. Last night when it cut off, I turned it back on and when I put it in drive it didn't rev when I hit the gas, even in neutral it wouldn't rev...... On to today... I took it down the road a little to get it to a better place to work on it and it cut off on me again. It sounded like it was backfiring, but sounded like it was coming from the engine. The idle was way off and irregular, and only made the backfire noise when the truck wasrevved, which the throttle response was sluggishwhile it was in park and also when it was in neutral or park. I put the hood up and got a friend behind the wheel so he could push on the throttle and make sure it didn't overheat. When I got him to push on the throttle the popping noise was from the air box. The air filter was jumping up a little in the box. I took the top off the box and had him do it again and sure enough the air filter was the thing making the noise. Now, with these symptoms I think it could possibly be the vaccuum system because of the irregular idling and the issue with the air filter. What does everyone else think?

 

Sounds like a valve timing/camshaft issue...if you are getting backpressure thru the intake, theremay be an intakevalve that is overlapping the compression stroke pushing air thru the intake. Timing chain? Can you do a compression check?

 

What about the throttle position sensor?

 

Ok, I tried getting it here again. I flat towed it back to the house and decided to crank it up to back it into the driveway. When I did, it ran perfect. It didn't do the forcing air into the air box thing. So when its warmed up it messes up, when its dead cold it runs ok, but that lasts all of 15 min. If it was a valve timing/camshaft issue wouldn't it do that all the time and not just after it warms up?

 

That's kinda what I thought...just throwin things out there. Lemme do some research...

 

Ok. Thanks to everyone. I am rackin my, and friends' brains and am coming up with nothing. I talked to someone at an auto parts store and they said that it may be the ignition control module, yet I dunno because of the works fine while cold thing and don't wanna shell out the $130 for that if that's not it, ya know?

 

This sound right...

http://dodgeram.info/tsb/1998/18-48-98.htm