rev up your engines, today I'm gonna talk about a common problem that happens all
the time, this vehicle runs fine and then it just stops running, then it starts right
up again, happens on highway, happens in town
it happens pretty infrequently, so let's get going now, just guessing on a vehicle
like this is totally futile, so we need some serious information, out with the
big scan tool, we're gonna need some serious information on this thing
hooking it up is simple, you just turn the key on so it's on the on position, but not
running, then plug it into the data port which is under the dash right here, and
this launch is Wireless so, push the Dodge and we'll start out, now it can take a
while because there's an awful lot of information that's stored in the
computer that we're gonna have to look at, because let's face it in the olden
days something that would die maybe once a
month or once every couple of months it was pretty much impossible to track down
but with this modern technology we get a lot better idea of what system can be
breaking down, but now it's figured out what vehicle this is so I'll push okay
and start analyzing stuff, system scan, the first thing we're checking for are
obvious trouble codes, it probably won't have any but you always you have to
check that first, because you always check the obvious things when trying to
figure out why a car acts up every once in a while, it's doing its thing it's 37%
done and it hasn't found any codes yet, oh there's one now, in this case even though
the check engine isn't on, there's trouble code stored, so just because
your check engine light isn't on doesn't mean that there's not codes that a
mechanic can access, and now it's done it's a typical Chrysler it's got 1 2 3 4
5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 23 separate fault codes, now we gotta
analyze all these codes and break them down to see which one could make the
vehicle actually stop running, typical Chrysler it's got a whole bunch of
problems, but a lot of them are ancillary stuff, doors, the gate, the radio, the main
thing we're gonna be looking at is the body control module, because that
controls all kinds of things in the vehicle, well the body control code was for
the front fog lamps, oh well it's not bad
either, so here we go none of those codes that a mechanic can
get with a fancy tool is gonna help us figure out why the stupid thing died, now
we got to be logical and think, what's gonna make a vehicle conk out, well now
comes the fun of looking through all the data on a vehicle to see if there's any
bad data using my mechanics brain, so we have to go through all these things to
see if any data is really offline, well that was a lot of information and made it all
the way to the w to washer fluid and that was fine, couldn't find anything
that had bad data, so none of the data is off, but of course all is not lost
this thing can check systems to see when there was a Fault and it actually found
that it did have a triggered fault, and it says triggers fault caused by the
programming, and being a Dodge that doesn't surprise me, they have computer
problems up the wazoo as they age, the customer told me that this
thing was going down the road working fine, then
it just died going 60, but then it started right back up again, it's more a
classic sign of something's gone wrong in the computer system, it can also be a
weak fuel pump, so I pressure tested that and it shows perfectly fine now but I
kind of figured out because it's running perfectly fine, and anyways if the fuel
pump went bad and it died on the highway, it wouldn't start right back up again, now
to be absolutely sure my diagnosis of course, I would have to drive this thing
with the computer scanner hooked up until it actually died, I'm gonna try
that for half an hour but let's face it, nobody's gonna be paying the $100 an
hour to drive this thing around if it happens once a month or once every three months
that's going a little bit too far, but now I'm using even more brain power, I'm
looking up every technical service bulletin for this crazy thing and here's
one it says, recall alternator may fail resulting in engine stalling, now I did
test the alternator with my machine it shows it's okay now, but when you ever
recall like that it can be that it stops working it starts work and it's
electronic, so I'm gonna have to customer take it in and see if they'll
give him a free alternator at Dodge, I printed a copy of this recall notice and
I can hand it to my customer, the main thing you need is the campaign number but the
whole piece of paper explains the whole recall on the alternators that you can
show to the dealer, now being a professional mechanic I use all data
repair to get all this information, but of course you can get all recall
notifications from the NHTSA website, as you can see here you just put your
vehicle identification number in and you could look up any vehicle you have here
in the United States, it's been three weeks the customer called me, the dealer gave
him an alternator for free, said the old one was breaking down which makes sense
if you don't have enough electricity to run the ignition of the fuel system, it
can knock all the computers out and the car will stop running, but I do have to say I'm
not holding my breath on that one, it is a nine year old Dodge and it had all
those different trouble codes in it, I wouldn't be surprised at all if there
was also something wrong with the computer system of the car that was
starting to break down, I see that an awful lot in the Dodge products
especially when they have all those different trouble codes, a lot of times
it means the main circuit board is starting to break down inside the
computer, but let's hope that it's a permanent fix
that will last for a long time and the stupid thing won't just stop running in
the middle of nowhere for something that no one can actually figure out the
reason underlying that death, so if you never want to miss another one of my new
car repair videos, remember to ring that Bell!