Hello all. This site is great first off. .. I have a 97 ram 1500 5.9 4x4 220k I just found out that by guessing I spent a lot of $ rebuilding my transmission for no reason. I have a stutter at 55ish that I now believe is caused by the misfire in cyl 4 and 5 . For three months I have been reading and buying stuff I did not need . I replace wires, coil, plugs, dist cap , and button to no help. I told the guy that I was having rebuild the trans about the misfire codes he said they were no big deal . Makes me wonder about the job I got ... Today I brought the truck to and reputibale trans shop that tested the transmission and said it was fine that the mis fire in the (2) cyl's were causing the stutter. So when I got home I pulled the plugs in the 4 and 5 cyl and both were yellowish . so I was told to test the fire in the cyl, to put an extra plug in the wire and hold up to metal.. I did ..It was sparking like crazy..Both cyl's . So what I'm asking Is does this mean I need a valve job as I'm told ? If that is the case since I spent $1100 on trans my funds are limited now. Should I just look for a motor at junk yard instead of a valve job? Your thoughts would be app-reached .

 

I think I'ld do a compression check of all the cylinders first.

 

might wanna check this out

https://dodgeforum.com/forum/2nd-gen...ml#post2047345

common problem.... welcome to df!

 

Help me out ..What will a compression check tell me . I'm pretty new to working on stuff. I will borrow one tomarrow

 

Thank you and I'll read the link now!

 

what you did with the spark plug was to test for presence of spark. that's a good first step, but its only one test.

a compression test will check for cylinder integrity, in order to rule out major malfunctions such as leaking head gasket, rings, valves, or cracked head. a good cylinder will test somewhere in the 120-160 psi range. you'll want to test all cylinders to see if any one or two are significantly different than the others.

a misfire is a fancy word for a skip. its when one or two cylinders are not producing power like the others. problems could be caused by lots of reasons, including spark, compression, fuel injector, etc.

 

Thanks for the info dhvaughan. I will c if I can pick up a compression tester tomorrow and I'll post results . Thanks for your help!

 

did you change the plugs/wires yourself? i know that if the #5 and7 wires touch, it can create a misfire as well as wires #2 and 6 (i believe), becuase of the fact that they fire after one another.

 

I did change my self 3 different sets so far 3 different ways and reset comp each time and still same-thing so far

 

missfire could also be because the injector itself is missfiring. See if the injector connectors for that cylinder are tight and have the metal hold downs. If they do not...that is your problem. The connections are not tight and the more vibration the more they will rattle and come loose (hence 55mph).

THat is just a cheap thing to check.