My Caravan has developed a shutter when at cruising speed, at any speed. Seems like it losses power for an instant then picks back up. It is very random at any speed and I don't feel anything up through th steering wheel so I dont think its the tranny however it does have 215000k on it. Any suggestions would be appreciated
Thanks in advance
Martin

 

Is it backfiring at all? If it is, relpace the plugs and wires.

 

The vehicle does not backfire at all, I have also noticed when starting it has started to turn over longer before it will start,(not sure if that would be related to the original problem or not)

 

My 97 does the exact same thing! I thought I was going nuts the first couple times, because it happened so fast. Nobody could ever tell me what it was. BUT....I think I fixed it. Look at your hot wire going from the battery to the fuse box, and from the fuse box to the alternator. Both of mine were corroded inside. They showed no signs of outward corrosion. I discovered it by accident when I needed to replace the hot terminal after the old one cracked. I did the rewiring 3 weeks ago, and the "hiccup" hasn't happened since. Keeping my fingers crossed.....

 

Hmm, I'll have to take a look at the wires on my van when I get home. I basically have similiar symptoms. It will buck around 40 - 45 mph, seems like it could be the tranny, but I'm not sure. It has gotten much worse since I started running the AC the last few days. Thanks for the tip. When you say they were corroded inside, did you just notice this at the ends, or did you peel back the insulation and look at the whole wire?

 

I peeled back the wire some to replace the terminal. That's how I found it. HOWEVER: I may have spoken too soon as it "hiccupped" on the way home from town this afternoon. Hm....... I had the cruise control set at 60 when it happened, and it acted like I canceled the cruise. It dropped, then the speedometer went back to 60 for a second, then the speed started slowly dropping. I hit "resume" and it went back to 60. Still I wonder why it quit for so long if it wasn't a wiring problem. Of course, there are thousands more wires.....

 

I had a similar (almost brief stall) but hiccup describes it well too on my 1991 3.3l GC. Mine actually ended up being my Cam position sensor, which at about 220,000 miles had finallydeveloped a short in the wire. Took forever to find. Started slowly jiggling all my connecters. and wires and finally found I could make it hesitate at that wire with regularity. Car drove fine, but at subtle bumps or accelleration to pass it would hiccup. The right motor mount would actually jiggle the wire enough to do it (yes , mount was whipped). Good Luck on this one, I really hate intermittent electrical problems because of the difficulty in isolating them.