Greetings and salutations to all you Dodge Ram enthusiasts,

My name is Joe I was a mechanic most of my teenage and adult life. I have been out of the auto industry for about 10 years but still do most of my own work. I have a 2002 Dodge Ram that I love. My wife and I call it Big Blue and its primary job is towing our 26 ft. travel trailer on family vacations.

The truck has 160,000k miles and has really been flawless except for all the work I had done while it was under the extended warranty. Most of that has been minor things like door locks and switches..etc..

I tune it fairly regularly and for the most part it has been pretty flawless until last Friday night. We were on our way out and had stopped at the gas station to get some food. I went out to get started and it cranked and did a poor start and sounded and acted like it was barely running. It eventually started to free spin with no indications that there was any compression or resistance.

My first thoughts were the timing chain jumped it had all the classic symptoms. I had it towed about 94 miles to home . Please invest in AAA it was a life saver if you get the extended service for $38 a year you can't beat it. The driver even dropped it so it rolled right into my garage bay it was heart warming to say the least.

I should have tested further but my ego was in full swing needless to say it got a new timing chain and water pump and fixed a pesky water seepage issue while it was apart. Reassembled the engine and guess what you know it didn't start. Now that my broken ego was picked up from the floor I began to re-diagnose. I found my first indication was when I sprayed ether into the throttle body and it started. I quickly put the fuel injection gauges on and found that no pressure was there at all. Surprise I was looking at a fuel pump now with a full tank of gas in the tank no less.

I managed to get the tank down and had a minor but beneficial accident when the tank slid off the jack so one end was up in the air and the other end was on the ground. The hoses were reachable from the left rear wheel well with the tire removed. I went on line and found a deal at advance auto using promo codes I ended up getting the new unit for $130.00. I syphoned the gas out of the tank when I removed the old unit and managed to get the tank back in place with the floor jack.

I did have an issue the sending unit does not register on the dash unit but the pressure gauge shows that I have lots of fuel pressure now on my pressure gauge. I thought great it started and idled while it warmed up and I filled the cooling system. I went to pull out of the garage and it would not take any throttle it bogged down and died. I at this point banged my head against the steering wheel several times.

I then thought since it was a fuel issue perhaps what ever had killed my pump had gotten into my injectors as well. I had a hose kit from a 3M fuel injector cleaner kit and got a can . I pulled the fuse and ran the truck off the can it ran for about 5 minutes until it died. replaced the fuse and took it out of the garage and it was showing signs of improvement but it was still bogging down and would run very poorly when i tried to give it gas. I did do a power brake holding the brake and gas and it felt like it should have pulled the house down. No power other then that.

I thought about the problem some more and it occurred that maybe my Catalytic converter had failed and was clogged. I at this point have no codes from the computer so I assume that most of my problems are mechanical since nothing is showing up in the computer. I put the timing light on it to see if the computer was at least working the timing and at idle it was 15 degrees advanced. I am in the process of pulling down the exhaust to see if it runs any better . I have a few more thoughts but I am hoping that I can get some feed back and some suggestions from my fellow Dodge maniacs.

I will let you know if this was my problem but some thoughts had gone through my head like is my computer bad and that' s why its not giving me any codes? I know about the IAC motor and how it gets dirty but the idle was never really rough . I was also thinking a bad coil could give me the same symptoms so if anyone has the coil specs I will check that out as well. I do still have the original wires on it, I know its on the list of **** to do sometime. Now that I am half way through the exhaust removal and have the new repair collar for the pipe I can go finish cutting the damn thing off.

I have one other question will a re-programmer wipe out the programming and could it possibly fix the old computer if it were bad. I know you probably need a working computer to begin with.

 

Welcome to the site. I will move this thread to the third generation Ram section,
FF

 

Thanks now that ya know how I made it here .

 

Welcome to the site. Since you have an 02 (with the 5.9 I assume) you could also check with the guys in the 2nd Gen section as they might also be able to help out

 

to check your o2 sensor take the precat out of the exhaust and take a quick drive, if you have better power chances are the CAT is plugged up. Have you cleaned your TPS and IAC? Have you checked the Plenum for any leaks, this is a common problem with the 5.9 magnums

 

I actually did check for vacum leaks as I thought I had a water leak at the intake in the front but turned out to be the thermostat housing. I have not checked the IAC yet that was on my mind. The exhaust was dropped and it made no difference. I ran into some hardware issues putting the exhaust back up with the replacement split flange. Tomorrow I plan on checking the coil and wires with an ohm meter. I still have a feeling its going to be something stupid like a bad coil.

I wasn't sure which generation my Ram was it seems like 02 was the bastard child. I found the specs I needed in the 2001 manuals at least I hope its the specs I need.

 

did you look down your throttle body and check for pooling oil?

 

Ok update I verified the coil was ok I replaced the plugs I did buy wires and a new cap and rotor but I don't feel thats the issue it starts but was rough at first about 4 trys of starting and shutting off then it kicked over and idled smooth after a little surging. I let it warm up and it smoothed out the same issue no power when trying to accelerate. I ran into a snag my computer program for my OBD2 was not working properly I wanted to check the TPS readings and the map sensor. Tomorrow I will have time to get back to it and I plan on pulling the throttle body and cleaning the IAC tip and motor. Still no codes being registered but I feel the problem is in the computer system or sensors.

 

Dodgeboy no pooling it was bone dry but the IAC was filthy and the shaft can be moved in and out pretty easily. I cleaned it up but I thought I read somewhere that it should only move a 1/4 inch when its off the vehicle. Can someone confirm this . The TPS and MAP both work when actuated manually or at least gave me reading on the ohm meter.

 

Perhaps the crank sensor back on top of the bellhousing if it happens again.