Durango Help

[slantsixness]

Originally Posted by fwasilewskilak

I just wanted to thank everyone for all the post about the PCM, I took the Durango into the shop yesterday and, with a little help from a pretty good technician, he diagnosed that the PCM was faulty pretty quickly. It looks like that EPA warranty should cover the cost but it will take a week. Oh well, at least we will be up and running again thereafter. Thanks a lot to everyone and I hope I can help someone out as you all did for me on this website at some point.

You can help us now:
What does "fwasilewskilak" mean?

My money is on "Wasilewski" is your last name...

[BleedDodge]

Lol!

[RobTur]

I havent bent over for the dealer yet, I opened the case to the PCM and it is filled with resin. I assume it is a good heat conductor. I am going to try to rig a fan/heatsink and see if it works...anyone else try this. My warranty ran out two months ago.

Originally Posted by fwasilewskilak

Thanks again guys. Sounds like I will need to just leave my D-Rang with the dealer mechanic for a while then. That sounds like the only way to get the PCM fixed.

Did any of you think about the idea of inserting some sort of 12-volt fan or air duct that would keep the PCM cool and prevent this from happening? Any thoughts on that idea?
Also, does anyone know where the PCM is located on the truck and what it looks like?

[fwasilewskilak]

That sounds like an idea to try. I thought of doing that but since they were able to diagnose the PCM being the problem even without the codes, I went for the new PCM, supposedly it is an improved PCM. For anyone having trouble similar to this, let the technician know that you think it is the PCM. Since it is such an intermittent problem that they cannot easily diagnose and the computer does not register these codes for some reason, tell the technician to try heating up the PCM with a heat gun and this should cause the car to fail. The technician then tested all sensors, grounds and connections to make sure that the PCM was the problem. This seemed to work well. The technician did however tell me that they don't never open up the PCM. When it is determined that it is faulty, they just get a new one and send the faulty one back to Dodge. Opening up your PCM may be good but it may be nothing you can fix.

[fwasilewskilak]

F = First initial
Wasilewski = Last name
LAK = Group of friends

you happy now?

[RobTur]

Just behind the pcm is a 3.5" square opening in the fender frame, an 80mm case fan should fit there with some brackets. Its a shame they couldnt use the air intake to pull air around this better. Its only 6in. away....I figure even if I do need a new PCM this will keep it happy too.The $10 fan make self destruct under the heat but hmm.. we'll see.

Never give in....until the wife needs the car back.

[fwasilewskilak]

Let us know how that works out. Seems like a good plan to me!

[slantsixness]

Thanks "F" that's a long screen name

As far as the PCM cooling, why not just use a piece of air inlet hose connected from the air cleaner inlet hose and directing some (lots when moving) air to the PCM directly? Seems like it would save from replacing a fan every 6 months....?

[BleedDodge]

LAK=group of friends? You lak friends? I don't get it but whatever, lol.

I've never heard of anyone having to cool the PCM before. That's something new to me...

[fwasilewskilak]

Read This thread and you will find many answers to the haunting PCM problem!

[RobTur]

Never actually got the fan working, i did buy some memory cooling heat sinks for about $15 and placed them on it. However the wife really wanted the car working, so to the dealer I went :.^(
$635 later the car works:^) Anybody interested in the mounting procedure let me know ive got pics...dont ask about that burning motor smell after I hooked it up. 12V motor car actually runs about 14-16V :^O

[rbailey1616]

Due to the excellent info out here I wanted to post my story in hopes to save others some money since I have benefited the same way because of this thread.

Symptoms: My '99 Dodge Durango started to stall. Usually after a couple minutes on the side of the road the 'no bus' or 'no sub' message would disappear from the odometer and I could restart the car.

I noticed this would happen only when the car was warm. It wouldn't happen in the mornings on the way to work as my car sat in a garage overnight. It would happen on sunny 80+ degree days after the car had been sitting for part of the day on an asphalt parking lot. And the stall would happen within 5 miles from that lot.

I took it to the dealer who for $50 ran some tests. Because the PCM resets itself in this situation they will never be able to pinpoint the correct problem (although the heat gun to the PCM approach sounds like it should do it). The dealer did find a fault in the BCM but couldn't guarantee it would solve the problem. Because of this site I took my car and ran without making that $400 repair. I then put a layer of insulation over the PCM all the way down to the air intake area of the engine. I did this for a couple weeks. It seemed to help the situation as it put more cooling air on the the PCM. I don't know if it would have held in 90+ heat or not. Because of an upcoming vacation I decided that based on this site I had enough info to ask for the PCM to be replaced. The dealer was a little skeptical but based on the info from this site then agreed (of course wouldn't guarantee squat).

It's been two months and there has not been a stall. Of course the PCM was around $600. The BCM would have been $400. Had this thread not been out here I'm sure I would have started with the BCM and then who knows. So somehow I feel good about making a $600 repair to my 6 year old Durango. How did Dodge do that?