Can the crank position sensor be going out but still work occasionally?

97 ram 1500 2wd 5.9L

I will be driving along and the truck dies while driving. Sometimes it will fire right back up on its own and keep going, other times it's been too long and I put it in neutral while coasting turn the key and it starts. Then other times like last night it died and I had to pull over because it would not start.

I sat there and played around with it and it never started, finally got out, popped the hood, wiggled the coil wire and it started. I thought that was it but I don't think so. New msd blaster coil about 2 years old now. So then I drove 300 yards and it did it again. Wiggled the coil wire several different times and nothing. Waited for a while and it started. It got me home.

I left it running popped the hood, after it idled for a while it started running badly, sounded like a vacuum leak until I revved the engine and it stopped. Then it idled OK for a few minutes and did same thing again, poor idle and somewhere in the engine it sounded like weird vacuum leak. I felt the large vacuum line coming out of passenger side intake and it was vibrating.

I reset my pcm the other day because truck threw a code for oxygen sensor but since reset code hasn't been thrown again. I figure engine running bad was causing the o2 sensor issue.

Thoughts? Thanks.

 

PS: hard to test anything because next day when I get a chance dang truck will fire up fine, run fine, and won't have issues for several trips, then all of a sudden boom, it starts all over again.

 

Might be the PCM going. I keep a spare handy just in case I run into bizarre issues such as this.

 

I am thinkin' either the cranks sensor, or cam sensor, is getting hot, and failing. Need to see what you are missing when it doesn't wanna start. Spark, or fuel. (test for spark, if you have it, then fuel is the likely culprit.)

 

Update:

Look what I found... No wonder I was getting an O2 code...






At first I thought is was burnt off but then I saw the cap was crushed right at the connector base and the wire was ripped off. Not sure how that happened or how long its been that way either...





I also found the crank position sensor socket was busted. It didn't look hopeless but with my recent rear main leak and trans pan leak it had a ton of gunk built up on it. It was also broke far enough down that the seal on the male end of plug was not sealing the socket anymore. It was dirty inside but not too bad. I think I got to it just in time.

I cleaned it out real good, used a q-tip to get inside good, then I used a thick layer of dielectric grease around the male end of the plug, slid it in and I think the grease filled the broken gap pretty good. After that I went ahead and used electrical tape and made it solid. Should be fine now I think.

 

Any chance you guys think this is going to solve my truck dying issue, or is this just another link in the chain?

 

Isn't the plug with the red stuff your speed sensor? Crank sensor is up on the bell housing, I thought.


But, yes, I would think it would help.

 

Um yeah, woops, plug on rear of tranny is my speed sensor...

Big question here is do you guys thing changing my o2 sensor is going to fix my truck dying and then not starting issues? Or do you think its just another link in the chain? As in "yeah its gonna fix your bad idle but its probably not gonna fix your truck dying issue, that is something else." ??

Thoughts?

 

No. It's a separate problem.

 

2 park fix:

O2 sensor issue:
So first of all, I fixed the o2 sensor and its been running great after that, just a quick update on that fix.

Truck dying suddenly issue:
Well you were right about that. Drove truck for a couple of days with no issues. Then boom, Wednesday morning I fired the truck up, let it warm up, drove about 10 miles and i'm doing 75 on the interstate and it first studdered and then shut off completely. Same issue I have been having.

So i bought a bluetooth code reader and i had torque running at the time. it read the P0351 code.

I did some research on that and had a look at loose connections TO the coil. I found 2 things.

1. No loose connections, wiggled everything and couldn't get the engine to spudder or shut off.

2. I found I was dumb and put dialectric grease all the way up in the new spark plug sockets all over the metal and not just around the boot.

So i found grease on the tip of spark plug and figured hey maybe that's my connection problem. So far that is not the case. I cleaned the grease off tip of plug and inside the boot. I also messed around with the coil and PCM connectors and harness. Nothing made the truck miss or die. Dang thing is running like a champ right now. It's very intermittent.

I find it funny however each time the truck dies on me, I go wiggle and knock on the coil and it fires right up again. But not until I do those things when this happens. Maybe its been sitting just long enough things start working again.

So this time it fired back up, I drove home, no issues again since.

Last time this happened I could get it to start, then it would die again, then I would get it to start and it would die again.

Without it going all the way out and stay that way I am finding it very hard to troubleshoot when I get home to grab the multi meter. Maybe I can carry it with me when it happens but doing this safely on the side of the road may be difficult.

Suggestions?