2006 Dodge Caravan SXT Electrical (?)
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2006 Dodge Caravan SXT Electrical (?)
Hi Gang... Looking for some input here for the events over the past two days with my 2006 Dodge Caravan SXT.
Yesterday, I was driving home from work and about 4 or 5 miles into my commute the battery light came on. Of course the van wouldn't start. I started by replacing the battery (a new one was needed anyway) and a couple of miles after replacing the battery the battery light came on again so I did the 'field alternator test' (pulled the neg battery cable) and the van stalled. I did some research last night on here and deduced that it could be the alternator or PCM module going bad. Since the vehicle stays running once it is started, I figured I'd drive it to work today and start by replacing the alternator this weekend to see what happens. Well, this morning it started with no problem. No battery light and the charging system appeared to be working fine. On the last mile of my 17 mile commute to work, the transmission jumped into 'limp mode' (stuck in 2nd gear), the tach and spedo needle went full clockwise and counter clockwise a couple of times. The airbag light and abs light both came on steady and the brake light flashed pretty fast. Yes, I was scared (driving 55mph on the expressway). during this process, the radio and center console came on and off a couple of times before going dead. The floodlight for the gauge cluster went out and I'm unsure at this point if the headlights were working. Another 1/4 mile down the road, the odometer/gear indicator LCD's were bright towards the area where they are adjacent to each other and faded to dim the further left on the Odometer you looked and dim the further right on the gear indicator that you looked.
Any ideas for where I should even begin looking for faults?
H. Venticinque
Buffalo, NY
Yesterday, I was driving home from work and about 4 or 5 miles into my commute the battery light came on. Of course the van wouldn't start. I started by replacing the battery (a new one was needed anyway) and a couple of miles after replacing the battery the battery light came on again so I did the 'field alternator test' (pulled the neg battery cable) and the van stalled. I did some research last night on here and deduced that it could be the alternator or PCM module going bad. Since the vehicle stays running once it is started, I figured I'd drive it to work today and start by replacing the alternator this weekend to see what happens. Well, this morning it started with no problem. No battery light and the charging system appeared to be working fine. On the last mile of my 17 mile commute to work, the transmission jumped into 'limp mode' (stuck in 2nd gear), the tach and spedo needle went full clockwise and counter clockwise a couple of times. The airbag light and abs light both came on steady and the brake light flashed pretty fast. Yes, I was scared (driving 55mph on the expressway). during this process, the radio and center console came on and off a couple of times before going dead. The floodlight for the gauge cluster went out and I'm unsure at this point if the headlights were working. Another 1/4 mile down the road, the odometer/gear indicator LCD's were bright towards the area where they are adjacent to each other and faded to dim the further left on the Odometer you looked and dim the further right on the gear indicator that you looked.
Any ideas for where I should even begin looking for faults?
H. Venticinque
Buffalo, NY
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Registered User
Joined: Sep 2011
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Thanks for the input! Unfortunately though, the charging issue stopped this morning. The battery is charging normally and until the events happened that I described from this morning happened, everything was running normally. No voltage warning lights ever came on at all during this morning's commute. I'm wondering if these two issues are related or are they two separate issues?
H. Venticinque
H. Venticinque
