92 Dakota won't start

Starting trouble. 3.9 liter. History is like this. Daughter was driving and it started stalling. I went to check. It would crank but only rarely fire. Eventually it started, drove it home. Next day no start. Replaced rotor (had similar exerience with bad rotor couple years ago). Still nothing. Changed distributor trigger plate. Put in some injector cleaner (daughter has been running with very little gas in the tank - has not run dry to my knowledge). Not getting any codes.

I found a problem with a vacuum hose, and replaced it. I pulled the right side fuel rail, the injectors fire sequentially with good output. Fuel pressure is 35+ psi. Coil gives spark, but it looks a little weak to me.

The following happens when cranking. Cranking for long duration with no fire. Then it will begin to fire on ONE cyl per rev. If I crank long enough, it will evually fire enough to start - firing on just a couple cylinders. If it stays running, it will eventually "clear" (as if it was flooded) and run okay. (duration of cranking is several minutes. I have to jump it to keep juice. I know, this is probably killing my starter, but I have no other way to troubleshoot) Then when cut off, it restarts okay most of the time, but later might not start.

When cranking, spraying starting fluid in TB makes no difference.

I've heard people mention "crank trigger" - does this thing have a crank trigger as well as the distributor trigger plate?

Well that hall effect pickup inside the distributor is what you should change now. That's probably what it is.

You shouldn't abuse your starter like that. If it doesn't fire up right away you should already realize that it's not going to. You should never have to spend more than 10-15 seconds cranking unless it's really really flooded and you know for sure that it is...

As mentioned above, I already changed the distributor pickup.

An update on the problem. I've gotten it started and running well enough to drive around close by. I noticed that when you jump on the throttle, it bogs like a carbeureted engine that has a bad accelerator pump.

Anybody have similar problems? I've heard the coolant sensor mentioned several times with these problems. Where is it, and why would it cause the hard starting? I'm still thinking it's due to trash in the system from running low on fuel, although the injectors seemed clear.

Thanks for any help you can give.

One other thing forgot to mention. Fuel pressure runs about 20 psi after engine starts. Is this normal?

You are indicating you have the MPI system, so no, that should run 35-45 lbs. Or 44-49, depending on who you believe. The coolant temp sensor is the device that tells the PCM that the water temp is at least 100F, thus allowing the PCM to go into closed loop operation. It is located up the beer barrel, above the #2 injector, (right at the west end of the pass. side fuel rail.) Has anyone ever removed the distributor? If so, was the fuel sync. signal properly reset?

Thanks for the info on the temp sensor. I may change that because it seems to be critical to proper ops and it's not too expensive. The dist has never been changed or even pulled to my knowledge. I get the 35 psi prior to starting, but it won't stay that high while running. What is likely culprit there? Is there an adjustable regulator? (I know one thing I need is a decent repair manual for the truck - any suggestions?) I also noticed that the engine doesn't respond to things like turning on the air conditioner or putting it in gear (there's no increase in throttle to offset the load). Does that indicate something specific?
Thanks again for the help.

If you can't find an FSM on Ebay, go with the Chilton book. A couple of things we need to know: How many miles total? Do you have any codes? With what you say, you sure should have. If the miles are high enough, this does sound like a pump problem. You should have a return style system, but I'm not really sure if you have an external filter. If you do, it's on the inside of the frame rail, right under your behind as you sit in the truck. If you don't have one, then your system uses a 4864307 filter that clips to the bottom of the pump assembly.That can get clogged up after about 80,000 and affect pump operation. I'm guessing that the type of pump used in the GenII's has around a 140,000-160,000 service life. Way better that the GenI pumps. You really do have to check for codes as far as is a sensor involved here.

Thanks nightdriver. I would have thought I'd have codes too. Nothing there. All I get is a 12 (battery disconnected recently), which I caused by disconnecting the battery. I would assume any problem codes would return if there was a bad sensor or something. The truck has over 150 K miles. I'm begging to suspect basic fuel delivery (pump and or filter). Maybe I'll start with filters as that is certainly cheaper, and see if I get results. Thanks for the help.

instead of looking to replacing everything theres an important wire you should check...
my dad's '92 5.2 had this problem and that was only because it was stolen but then recovered...
the wiring housing from the key to the starter was disconnected under the steering wheel in the cab. this fixed the problem with me, and it was slanted outwards on the corner so just remove it then plug it back in and it worked great till it finally bit the dust at near 200k miles. sounds like everything else hasnt worked, so i thought this might be usefull.

there should be two groups of wires. one is very small and when disconnected only turns the key light off. the other more bulky one was the important one...

Thanks newdriver. This wire connection is beneath the steering wheel itself?