Hello all. I am at a loss. Brought my Durango in to the Stealership a month ago for several recalls. Had the TIPM, visor vanity light and brake booster replaced. They sent me home without repairing the alternator recall. Said Dodge didn't have a "fix" yet. No parts I later found out. Yesterday the alternator smoke itself and left me sitting on the side of the road. Thankfully I was prepared for the loss of power steering and all the chaos taking place on my dashboard. Blinking and flickering, wipers came on, radio turned off and on, engine surging. Just happy my wife and kids were not onboard. I called the dealership and they said I would have to pay for towing, new alternator and install. $650 for the alternator and "about" $200 for installation. Said I would get reimbursed in about 60 days. I was furious so I called FAC. Was told the New alternator would not be the one eventually rolled out in January 2018 to start the recall repairs. I than asked, if I would need to bring it back in January for the correct part if I decided to pay for the part now and she said no, that my recall would be"whole" if they replaced. I asked why they couldn't replace at their own cost like the recall would if this was to be the"fix" anyway. She said they couldn't do that. So I called the local alternator repair shop and he rebuilt for $145. I told him to not clean or paint so I could eventually have the recall performed if it later failed. He was good with that. Picked up today and he said it was charging great. Installed and checked with voltmeter by placing positive on positive cable leaving alternator and placed negative on negative jump stud in fender wall. Was only reading 11.8 volts. Not charging. Car starts fine, turned on all lights, radio, fans and let it run in driveway for about 20 minutes. No battery light. Start down the road and after I got the rpms up, battery light came on. Urrrgh!! If the PCM was fried, would it crank, drive and everything work as normal and not give any engine lights or trouble codes?

Need help on diagnosing. Probably will call alternator shop and get him to keep my old alternator"guts" to reinstall if I have to wait for the dealership to look at it.

I have read multiple posts about battery temp sensor but don't think the 2011 models have one. Also no fusible links as the voltage reads from alternator through system, just not enough to be charging.

Please help. Able to perform any work except PCM diagnostics as I don't have any way of knowing (symptoms) it's bad.

 

PCM is toast. I have to replace about every 1 out of 5 when alternator fails.

 

Yeah man, you're dealing with something that literally tens of thousands of 2011+ Durango and Jeep Grand Cherokee owners have been dealing with since 2014. Luckily you were one of the few who knew what to expect when the failure happened and you were able to get off the road and out of traffic, and thank goodness your family wasn't stranded with you. The issues you brought up in your post are well grounded and have been covered well on this forum and other Dodge and Jeep forums by myself and many others. It's frustrating to say the least, dangerous to be more accurate.

As has been mentioned in other threads and by TNTech above, when the alternator goes it drags other crap down with it. PCM, TIPM and/or battery are the common victims. I have been involved in this fight since September when I bought my Durango and over those few months I have heard about a handful of guys who are getting FCA to cover the cost of TIPM, PCM and battery replacement and having their dealer just replace the bad alternator with whatever replacement parts were available - knowing full well they would be facing this issue again but having no other real alternative.

And that is what we're left with by FCA - no alternatives. They have been aware of this problem for three years, and have been figuring out h a replacement for over one year. Not one upgraded alternator has been installed under this recall which is now almost five months old. Thousands of people have been stranded, stalled in heavy traffic, etc and have had to pay out of pocket for tow bills, rental cars, and what amounts to temporary fixes for a SAFETY issue that there is an open, current recall for. My calls to NHTSA have fallen on deaf ears, I've asked others to contact NHTSA as well but I doubt anyone has. We are at the mercy of FCA. Hopefully no one gets hurt or worse while we wait for them to design, build and ship an alternator that will not do this again. There has been talk of a class action suit pertaining to FCA's lack of timely action, but I honestly don't know what that would accomplish at this point.

Anyway, check your battery. Maybe a new one will help. Good luck getting FCA to pay for it, but they might. We do have the battery temp sensors on our vehicles but that's most likely not the culprit at all.

 

Has anyone had any success with installing an external voltage regulator on one this new and bypassing the pcm for that function? I will perform more tests this afternoon on the plug from the pcm that connects to the terminal block to see if any voltage is present. I'm guessing its not getting power or grounding from pcm. I'm desperate to try anything that can be undone so I can still try and get the dealership to eventually fix without them knowing I have been tinkering with it.

Also, aside from waiting for the new parts to ship and trying to get the dealership to help see if they will cover the cost of the pcm, has anyone had any luck with the pcms online where you send your vin and mileage to them to have it flashed?

 

Seeing that other modules need to see target charging volts and actual charging volts over the BUS, a regulator might not work, but it's worth a try I guess.

The alternators get REALLY, REALLY HOT when they fail many times. I have read them with my trigger thermometer go as high as 475 degrees. Possible they could be reaching even higher temps as I've seen the labels and B+ covers melted/burned off before. Have lost several booster battery packs because the cables will melt, even had the actual booster plastic housing melt down one time.

For some of you that think your PCM might be wasted, you can try to leave the battery disconnected overnight and see if the PCM actually didn't melt the driver, only shut it down. I've saved a small amount of them.

Best thing to do to cover your own butt is when it happens, stop trying to run the engine and don't run it again until you have a new alternator. Don't even start it to move it. Disconnect the battery as well. As a tech, even one of 25 years, I can't argue on behalf with FCA and their refusals, shortcomings or whatever. Techs are the lowest life forms that exist in this realm of stupidity. ( facetious statement FTW) All I can do is tell what I would do.

 

Good info and advice, very valuable to many of us.

I'm not a tech, but I'd avoid doing ANYTHING like this and then still expect the dealer to play nice with you. TNTech seems to think it's worth a shot but my spidey senses say don't hack into anything brother. That's all they need to see before they start putting the blame on you for failures of components. My $.02.

 

I wouldn't try anything that would appear as I had tinkered with it. Slowly planning my course of attack. I just wish the parts were available and could get them to look at it for free and get a response. Dealers suck. Give me the run around. FAC needs to provide a clear list of potential failures as a result of the alternator and cover them. I know they won't cause it will cost them.

What about a salvage PCM? Can they be Flashed by someone other than dealer?

 

It's FCA, for Fiat Chrysler Automobiles.

And I've been told by more than one person at FCA that they ARE in fact determining that the alternator takes out other components when it goes. They know it, they've acknowledged it, and I've heard from more than a few people who have had dealers replace an alternator, battery, PCM and TIPM as a result of this alternator failure free of charge. Like I said, I know of at least one guy who got a rental car covered also. It's been done, the precedent has been set and we all should demand nothing less if we are faced with these failures. Do some searching on forums, arm yourself with that knowledge and bring that bastard back to the dealer and toss the keys to the service manager, demand rental coverage and tell them that they know EXACTLY what to fix and how to fix it to make your Durango right again and that they better hop to it.

You start shadetree'ing it up and you're gonna be left with no leg to stand on.

 

Prospect62 thanks for clarifying FCA.

You said our D had a battery temp sensor, where would it be located? Did not see it under the battery or on any connection to the battery under the seat.

Would like to rule out that and see if I have any fusible links that may have been fried.

Does anyone have wiring diagrams for the 3rd Gen Durango? I need to find the pin out from the PCM to the alternator so I can perform continuity checks on the field and sense wires. I can place test light on positive terminal and one of the wires that plug into Alternator and it lights up. I think this is the sense wire. The other wire is dead either on negative or positive post and key on/off. This may be the field wire that energizes the alternator and the culprit for the problem. If I can test the wire, I would be able to pinpoint the PCM. I may just test all pins for continuity and see what I can find.

 

If you can get your hands on a decent scanner, plug in, and see what the PCM thinks battery temp is.