Questions and Answers

Dying Dodge Caravan Q. Hi, I have a puzzling problem with my 1996 Dodge Caravan. It has a 3.0 liter V-6 with automatic transmission, fuel injection, ABS brakes, P/S, A/C and cruise control. It has 141,600 miles on it. This van goes dead while driving or idling with your foot on the gas or off the gas. We will be driving along fine maybe for two or three days and boom it goes dead.

I have to wait about two minutes and then it will crank again and before the gears change the first time it may go dead again or it may go dead when I'm doing 60 and then again it may not do this again for a day or two???? There is really no rhyme or reason to this madness however it does go dead. Three or four times in a row then drive very well for at least the rest of the day.

When I say go dead I mean the engine is still running at first but when you push the gas petal nothing happens. Then when you brake to pull off the road the engine dies and everything shuts down power steering brakes and all.

I guess I should also mention that we had a mechanic try to fix this problem about three months ago and he said we needed a new computer (ECM) so we replaced our computer but the problem came right back. My husband has been working with a friend to figure out what is wrong.

There is no codes to read and as you might expect it never does it with them and the computer hooked up. At first they were thinking the knock sensor is the problem, but now they are leaning towards the fuel pump

Do you have any advice you could give us? I hate to just start replacing parts and not find the answer.

Thanks for any help you can give me.
Laura

A. Before you start replacing parts hoping to fix the problem, you want to do a couple of tests. First test would be for fuel pressure. You need to know if the fuel pressure drops when it dies. If it does, then you need to see why. If there is power to the fuel pump when it dies, then it is a bad fuel pump. If the fuel pump loses power before it dies, then it is probably a bad Auto Shut Down relay. A very common problem with this vehicle.