Hey, I just aquired a 2001 Ram 1500, 3.9 v6 auto tranny, has about 160,000 miles on it, my daughter was driving home from a football game last night and the truck just went dead. When I got out there, I got in, tried to crank it and the motor would just barely turn over. I tried jumper cables and still would barely turn over, I pushed it off to the side of the road, get up this morning to go and try again, I hooked up the jumper cables, waited a minute or two and it started right up. So i get in, put it in gear and head down the road, but now its got a loud tapping noise loss of power, and it has a miss, at idle, its quiet as can be, once you give it gas you can feel the miss and it starts tapping loudly till the RPM's go back to idle and its all quiet. Dont know much about these motors, but could it have possibly jumped time? There is no codes, but I did get a check guages light, looked that up and people said to check connections in the relay/fuse box under the hood, did that, and now the check guages light is off. but still no check engine light. Any Ideas?
Thanks in advance!!

 

sounds like a plugged cat. get a rubber mallet or a dead blow hammer and get under there when its cold and smack the catalytic converter. if it sounds like its full of rocks then the catalyst material detached from the walls and plugged it up.
a plugged cat will give you a misfire and loss of power along with no exhaust note. and as far as the cranking issue, it could either be that the battery is bad or it has something to do with too much compression in the cylinders due to the exhaust being backed up.

when you got the check gauges light, which gauge was not where it should be? i got the check gauges light one time because my negative battery cable was loose and it made my voltage spike over 18 volts.

 

just as a quick and simple test, you can temporarily remove the front o2 sensor. it'll give you an exhaust pressure release and the truck will run ok w/o it, if it helps, then you've found the problem. if not then its something else.

 

I knocked on it, but it sounded hollow, it is the one thats smaller and closer to the engine right? The guage that quit working when the check guages light came on was the oil pressure gauge

 

the hammer test is quick too.

if you take the front 02 sensor out, zip tie it to something for the test drive so it won't be hanging and banging around on everything.

 

uh-oh. no oil pressure is kinda scary.

 

especially if it made the truck shut down.


yes its the one that's smaller and close to the engine. it will have a wire going to a sensor on the pipe in front of and behind it. a hollow sound either means that the catalyst is intact (it may still be plugged) or the cat is gutted out.

 

Well, i decided to try and pull the 02 sensor and see if I was lucky enough to just have a clogged Catalytic Convertor, cranked it up, and with the exaust leak i couldnt tell for sure if it was still tapping, it sounded like it was running right again, so I figured I would drive it down the road and if that was it, just clean out the Catalytic Convertor or replace it.
I made it about 100 yards or so, thinking hey it might be .... then all hell broke loose, now it sounds like someone is in the oil pan beating the crap out of it with a hammer....
Sounds like I need a engine now...

 

Guess now my question would be, do you guys have any suggestions on where to get replacement engines from, could i put like a 4.7 in there, if so would I have to change out the tranny and the rear end, and a whole bunch of other stuff, or just swap and drop?
Thanks

 

Lots to change if you want to try a swap. Things like the wiring harness, computer, etc.. Find a place that does quality rebuilds and/or reman engines that are ready to drop in.