Hello All,
I am new today to this forum but have spent many hours reading the posts. The question I have is Will a Distributor from a 1998 5.9 Magnum work in a 1995 or do I need to put the 95 Distributor in?
Currently the truck will idle but when given throttle it starts to backfires.
Do have a code 55.

I have a 1995 Ram 2500 4x4 with the 46RH and 5.9 Magnum
Bought it with the engine out and no history other than the odometer reads just over 109k on it.
Friend of mine had a 1998 2500 with a 5.9 Mag that was his daily till a tree fell on it. It still ran and drove but crushed. I pulled the engine from it and dropped it into my 95. Right away I could tell the wire harness was different and so I swapped over and used my 95 intake, the oil pressure sending unit,the PICK-UP COIL in the distributor but left the 98 distributor in as it was a running engine when pulled just the pick-up coil change so I could plug it into the wire harness.
I did replace the timing chain, water pump, thermostat, radiator, plugs, wires, cap, rotor, IAV, TPS

When I look up the distributors at the parts store website it appears the engines use different Distributors but appear to be the same.
Any help, suggestions, directions would be appreciated!

 

If looks like there was a revision to the distributor, but, still the same part number. (the two letters after the number) The sensor connector being different is just Dodge being dodge, the sensors work the exact same way.

Do you have the two wire coolant temp sensor hooked up? It is cleverly concealed behind the a/c compressor, next to the thermostat housing.

 

I Replaced the coolant Temp Sensor and put a new pick-up coil on it.
starts and idles until you hit the accelerator. When pushing on gas pedal it does not responded right away..its delayed in RPM,s rising and then once up to about 1500 rpms the backfire happens. Smells very rich and gassy. The only sensor i havent replaced now is the Map Sensor.
New 02 sensor. Clear cat and exhaust off the 98.
V8 on Crank lined up with TDC on cover , rotor pointing to #1. Timing should be Good,Right?


Pick-up coil....1995 on top and 1998 on bottom.

 

This is what it should look like at TDC #1 on the compression stroke. You have two temp sensors in the 95, What intake did you use? I believe the 98 has one(forget what year they changed). One for temp to the pcm the other for the dash gauge.

 

This is what i have right now without moving anything. Thoughts??


"V8"...TDC

 

If the yellow line on the pickup coil there goes thru the notch for time, align the yellow line with rotor. You only get a tolerance of plus or minus 7 degrees...

 

Just climbed up in to loosen the Distributor bolt and adjust to line everything up with yellow line.
using my phone camera to look straight down on it and now is lined up but now it backfires while idling through exhaust.
very Frustrating!!
I'll go back through and see if bumping one direction or the other will change anything.

Thank you for all the help replies so far.

 

Verify that you have the injectors hooked up properly. Get a couple crossed, and ya get some weird behavior.

 

Just adjusted distributor to align mark with rotor.
would idle with occasional backfire and smelled very rich. Bumped distributor counter clockwise and throttle response returned, idle smoothed a little and backfires when revving engine...but if you slowly increse throttle then it will climb. Still backfires
I kept bumping counterclockwise the distributor until it wouldn't run good anymore.
I then realignaligned crank on compression stroke and reset distributor and rotor. Started truck and Bumped distributor clockwise....now idles better, throttle response is better....but hesitates and then rev's....and backfires!!!

Coolant sensor is new and plugged in.
Temp Sensor new and plugged in.
Fuel Injectors are correct in location.

Going to pull timing cover off and check timimg marks next.

 

What is the yellow mark on the balencer? It it off that much? Did the balencer outer ring move? The notch should be TDC #1.