Topic: Any Dodge mechanics here?

[dhall57]

 But in his mind he still thinks he's saving money because he didn't get ripped off and pay $100 at the get go to have the dealership diagnose it. Bailgang your brother-in-law is definitely not the sharpest knife in the drawer

[trueblue]

But in his mind he still thinks he's saving money because he didn't get ripped off and pay $100 at the get go to have the dealership diagnose it. Bailgang your brother-in-law is definitely not the sharpest knife in the drawer

I know that, I regularly deal with idiots like that.  I'm a mechanic by trade, so it is my daily reality. 

[dhall57]

Yeah TB I run into this everyday also. I work in a parts department. I guess its just human nature and thinking you getting something for nothing. One thing that really amazes me is people will have a coupon for say a free oil change($25 value) but they drive from 100 miles away and burn a half a tank of gas to get there and they still think they saved money

[05c50]

I was a service manager in new car dealerships for 35 years, fourteen in a Dodge dealer, so I have some background in this sort of thing. I'm assuming that nothing concrete was found when the heads were removed and the current assumption (hope) is that the ECU needs to programed. It is true that it can't be programed at the dealer level without the truck. My concern at this point is that other problems may have been caused by the attempts to repair it. My suggestion to you, is that you be very candid with the dealership as to EVERYTHING that has been tried and take all the old parts (old ecu if you have it) with you. and be willing to pay for some proper diagnosis or you will probably will be getting a call from the dealership. "Ok, we've flashed your ecu and it still won't start. What do want us to do now?"  You can't imagine how many times I've had to make that call.
  On vehicles this old, it wouldn't be surprising if the problem was in the wiring leading to the ecu. Especially since you said that it all started with a wiring concern and that the engine started with a known good ecu. Many times wires are moved in such a way to cause or repair a problem.
  Please let us know how it works out.

......Paul

[Bailgang]

  On vehicles this old, it wouldn't be surprising if the problem was in the wiring leading to the ecu. Especially since you said that it all started with a wiring concern and that the engine started with a known good ecu. Many times wires are moved in such a way to cause or repair a problem.
  Please let us know how it works out.

......Paul

Interesting point because he did say he recently found a couple of broken wires behind the distributor that lead to the ecu. How it fired up with the known good ecu with those wires broken has everyone shrugging their shoulders, it could be as you mentioned that they were positioned just right but that's the focal point at the moment. Doing more damage due to unnecessary repairs concerns me too but although my bro-inlaws process of elimination may be flawed he is good at taking things apart AND putting them back together so hopefully that won't be an issue.

[Bailgang]

I finally got my first look at it in over a year and the broken wires my BIL had mentioned didn't lead to the ecu like my father in-law had said but were instead a couple of ground wires that lead to the engine block, still not a good thing. Come hell or high water this truck will run, maybe not this weekend because we still need to put the cyl heads back together then put them on the block then drop the engine back in the truck but this sucker will run. Please don't ask why the engine got pulled because I don't know either but it is setting comfortably on an engine stand at the moment and lets leave it at that.

[seanbarney41]

ok...perfect opportunity to ditch the ecu, fuel injection, and bull#$%* robot distributor...do it!

[05c50]

Please don't ask why the engine got pulled because I don't know either but it is setting comfortably on an engine stand at the moment and lets leave it at that.

.......aah, OK. And the hundred dollars to flash the ecu was too expensive?

..........Paul

[vfourfreak]

My sympathies Scott ! Persevere. I've never had this sort of issue with cars, trucks or bikes, but computers definitely !

It sort of works like this (in this case a fictional neighbour called Mr Head) :

Me : "so your PC won't boot, what have you done since it last did so"

Dick : "Well I deleted the contents of the Windows folder, reformatted the partition, and generally fcu*d about. But I need to get back all my files and photos"

Me : "Why did you not call a professional to diagnose the issue ?"

Dick : "They are so expensive"

Me : "Are your photos and files valuable ?"

Dick : "Invaluable !!!"

Me : "Have you backups, coz a rebuild is probably needed"

Dick : "Well, no"

Me : "Why did you not call me earlier, like before you fcu*ed around ?"

Dick : "Because I reckoned I'd have a go, and if that did not work you would be sure to be able to cure it. Now can I offer you a glass of wine while you fix it ?"

Me : "Sorry, I feel a case of Tourettes is about to overwhelm me. %èàè* ù$"# you, you *ù$^)ç !:;*ù$ $ù*3"

then I go home and drink a whole bottle of wine that only cost €2.50 and watch a war movie.

meddlers have a special place waiting for them.

Kev

[trueblue]

Kev, you have to remember to add the dickhead tax for the ones who can't stop playing with things they shouldn't

[Bailgang]

Well the engine is all together and ready to drop in but that will have to wait till next weekend and in the meantime my BIL intends on going through the wiring harness to make sure all is well, I'm not going to knock him on that because that's actually a pretty good idea. I don't care who's right or wrong on this, I just want this truck running however IF it doesn't start once all is back together and being the ego of both my FIL and BIL is so sensitive I must then tread VERY lightly in suggesting to take it to the dealership. If it doesn't fire up next weekend I must be very careful in how I choose my words when suggesting to taking it to the dealership because any hint what so ever that I'm right you're wrong will screw it all up and they will just continue chasing. Seriously, that's how stubborn their pride is. I do genuinely hope it does fire up next weekend and all is well with no need to take it to the dealership, I highly doubt it but I am crossing my fingers.

[trueblue]

Arrange a tow truck to pick it up when they aren't there.  Forgiveness is easier to get than permission. 

[Bailgang]

Well believe it or not we did get it to fire up today however it runs just as bad as it did when this whole mess started. It will only start with throttle about 1/4 to 1/2 open and when it does it wont respond to any throttle position change and then quit which is exactly what it did before. What spooked me was the absolute massive amount of blowby a breather tube on the valve cover was pushing out when just cranking the engine over, when plugging the breather tube with my finger it would build up pressure enough that it would sound like air rushing out of a balloon when I pulled my finger off. I've seen some crazy stuff in my years as a mechanic but never that. We pulled all the plugs and did a compression check and all but 2 cyls were lousy as in no more than say 60psi, the only 2 decent ones were around 120. It just doesn't make sense, if the rings were that shot to be letting all that pressure get by the rings and coming out the breather then this engine should've been smoking like crazy but it doesn't nor does it backfire at all. My BIL noted that it did the same thing 2 years ago when this fiasco started. The blowby of course increases once the engine starts but what's odd is that when I plug that breather tube it will immediately quit.

One trouble code that did pop up had to do with syncing the injector timing with the crank position sensor which from what I've read involves a DBRIII/DBR3 scanner so that's our next step but the massive amount of blowby is freaking me out. I have a bad feeling something obvious is looking us straight in the face and we're missing it so if any of you have ANY ideas don't be shy to let me know because I'm open to any idea right now.

[05c50]

The Chrysler diagnostic tool is a DRBIII and it is a very good tool, but it can't correct internal engine problems. The injector timing isn't going to change the compression. It's time to go back to basics, after failing a proper compression test, the next step is a leak down test to find out where the compression is going. I'm actually surprised that it started at all with only 60 pounds of compression. Good luck.

........Paul

[dave500]

its been too #$%*ed with now to give any well educated guess?just set fire to it.

[seanbarney41]

find somewhere to re-enact Dukes of Hazard scenes?...it is a Dodge after all









sorry, I know that's not what you want to hear

[dave500]

being a dodge it wont even handle getting fire set to it?dodges cant get anything right?

[trueblue]

If your compression rings are shagged, but your oil rings aren't you'll get a #$%*load of blowby but very little oil burning.  I'm not surprised it can run on only 60 lbs compression, my old petrol Fordson Dexta still ran with 20lbs of compression, it took a little winding to get it to fire, and once it did fire it poured smoke out of everywhere.  The wear in the bore you can measure in mm's not thou's .  Petrol engines are very forgiving in regard to compression.

Did the master mechanic take the pistons out while the heads were off, or did he leave them alone?

[Bailgang]

The Chrysler diagnostic tool is a DRBIII and it is a very good tool, but it can't correct internal engine problems. The injector timing isn't going to change the compression. It's time to go back to basics, after failing a proper compression test, the next step is a leak down test to find out where the compression is going. I'm actually surprised that it started at all with only 60 pounds of compression. Good luck.

........Paul

I agree that we're wasting our time with the DBRIII until we can determine  where/why we're loosing compression and producing so much insane blowby. The reason for pulling the heads was because of low compression readings, what  my BIL found was some combustion chambers of the heads had a hairline crack  going between the valve seats where the exh and int valve seats are closest to each other and thought that was the reason for the low comp #'s and didn't go any further than that as is pulling the pistons to check the rings. Those hairline cracks aren't good but it's actually a common problem that I've seen many times before and the engine still ran. What my BIL didn't tell me was that the blowby was there before and that should've been a clue because if that compression was being lost because of the valves not sealing properly due to the cracked seats then it should've been spitting that compression out the int or exh possibly inducing a backfire which it never did and now that it has a good set of heads on it it's still showing low comp #'s. I wish he had mentioned the blowby to me before because to me that's a clear indication it's loosing compression at the piston rings not the valves and a leakdown test should've been done before the old cyl heads were pulled.  Trust me the amount of blowby has to be seen to believe, I've worked on a lot of tired engines but I've never seen this amount of blowby coming from the valve cover breather on a gas engine before. This is where my BIL's process of elimination is completely out of whack because a leakdown test should've been done the moment low comp was a concern. I'm partly to blame for this because I washed my hands of it early on due to the timing chain fiasco. Don't get me wrong, I'm not some master mechanic either but if I knew then what I know now especially in regards to the insane blowby things would've taken a different direction.

[05c50]

 "The reason for pulling the heads was because of low compression readings, what  my BIL found was some combustion chambers of the heads had a hairline crack  going between the valve seats where the exh and int valve seats are closest to each other and thought that was the reason for the low comp #'s and didn't go any further than that as is pulling the pistons to check the rings." 


Ouch! New heads aren't cheap. Sounds like you may be reaching the value of the truck with a new engine controller, timing chain, and heads. With the amount of blowby that you're experiencing, I'd be concerned that maybe you have a broken piston, which could lead to a scored cylinder. Might be time to drop back ten and punt.

.................Paul

[Bailgang]

Ouch! New heads aren't cheap. Sounds like you may be reaching the value of the truck with a new engine controller, timing chain, and heads. With the amount of blowby that you're experiencing, I'd be concerned that maybe you have a broken piston, which could lead to a scored cylinder. Might be time to drop back ten and punt.

.................Paul

Yep it's getting to that point. What gets me is that it basically ran OK one day and then wouldn't hardly run at all the next so it's hard for me to comprehend that the rings could fail that bad so quickly and it probably ran with low compression for quite some time and could probably still run because it actually did run with a known good ECMfrom another truck. I say it ran OK rather than good because I had driven the truck about a month before it curled up and died and I can tell you that even though it was running on all 8 cyls it was very lame power wise especially considering it's a 360 ci engine which could've been a result of the bad compression. What is different between then and now is that when it first died is it's original ECM was throwing a whole slew of fault codes while this new ECM is only showing 2 and both those error codes have to do with the cam and crank position sensors being out of sync with each other and both cam and crank position sensors are new. Again I'm partly to blame because I never checked the cyl bores myself when the heads were off and I didn't realize the blowby until after it was all together and we were trying to start it yesterday. My BIL swears up and down the cyl bores were fine in regards to gouging or deep scratches but who knows with his track record. The ECM being flashed correctly could still be an issue because it did start and run with a known good ECM  but even if all was well electronically speaking and and are able to get it to start and run it's still going to be a lame duck HP wise.

[DH]

I'm wondering if the cam and crank sensor codes may be due to the distributor
being re-installed a few degrees different than it was before. IIRC, the distributor
being rotated will affect injector timing(?), not ignition timing like the old days. Someone correct me if that is incorrect. Still though, compression is an obvious
concern as others have stated, and the cam and crank sensors being out of sync are probly secondary. Just guessin

[Bailgang]

I'm wondering if the cam and crank sensor codes may be due to the distributor
being re-installed a few degrees different than it was before. IIRC, the distributor
being rotated will affect injector timing(?), not ignition timing like the old days. Someone correct me if that is incorrect. Still though, compression is an obvious
concern as others have stated, and the cam and crank sensors being out of sync are probly secondary. Just guessin

Correct, turning the dist one way or the other has no effect on ignition timing like you would assume it would as on earlier ignitions. The crank position sensor and ECM determine ign timing on this engine, the hall effect sensor in the dist has to do with fuel injection timing. That caught me by surprise when I found that out and we do have to double check the position of the dist rotor when #1 piston is a TDC to make sure both sensors are synced.

[Bailgang]

It's looking like the only reason the truck has fired up at all is because when starting a modern fuel injected engine at part throttle can put the ECM in what's called "limp mode" which would explain why it would run but not respond any further to throttle position.

However there is some good news that I think is very worthy of a shout out and it involves my BIL's son. To make a long story short my BIL is a very generous person who's always willing to help, generosity however is not a strong point with his son (my BIL's ex-wife is an absolute b...h). It's not that my wife's nephew is an outright punk but he is a bit self centered however he had us all eating crow and making my BIL a very proud dad yesterday. My in-laws truck is pretty much dead and the one car they do have is on it's last legs as well and they simply don't have the finances to do much about it and that's where my wifes nephew comes in. He recently bought a used car with the intent of flipping it to make a profit, nothing fancy about the car but it is in decent shape and runs well and in much better shape than the car my in-laws have. So what does my wife's nephew do? He goes to their house yesterday, sets the title to the car on the table laying it's keys on top and says happy early merry Christmas. He did this on his own with no prodding or suggesting from anyone, he simply saw his grandparents in need and decided to act. I thought that was just plain awesome.

[05c50]

Like it's been said, sometimes you can't judge a book by it's cover. It makes you feel good when you see a young person suddenly show a sign of maturity and generosity. There is a silver lining to the cloud.

.......Paul