Hey scotty,
Im working on a friends 2004 Chrysler Town and Country EX with a 3.8L V6. Its got 170,000 miles. So the van was sitting for a couple months and he told me it shut off while he was driving so he changed the battery and it did the same thing. So i checked the battery voltage, made sure it was the correct battery, cleaned the corrosion on the negative cable(positive cable had no corrosion but still cleaned it) and put a jumper on the battery to give it a little boost since it was at 11.60 volts. Started it up and it started and died. So next went to spray parts cleaner in the throttle body and nothing. Then he remembered he had an autozone printout of an engine code he had scanned for misfire on cylinder 3 and 4. So checked plugs and they were completely black, checked coils for spark and they were all sparking. So i changed the plugs, started it up and it was running very rough with idle surging and wanting to die unless i gave it gas and it smelled like rotton eggs coming from the exhaust. When the car died it gave me an maf sensor circuit high and o2 sensor bank 1 lean code. I checked continuity on the o2 sensor heater core wires and it was broken, replaced sensor and cleaned maf and iat sensor. Started up ran a little better but still rough. Started spraying for vacuum leaks and nothing. Cleaned, throttle body and replaced air filter. When cleaning iacv i noticed the rubber on outside of motor between the connector and motor was disintegrating but it still moved the valve when turning key on and used power probe to test it also. Could the motor malfunction since the rubber is crumbling? Then i replaced the PCV valve and started it up to see if it got better, it was idling rough still, then all of a sudden it started making a clacking sound coming from where the pcv valve is but then suddenly started idling perfect, no clacking, no throttle hesitation, no surging. Took it on a test ride and drove fine. Towards end of ride you could feel some stumbling, then pressed down on gas pedal and i swear i heard a pop and then the car died. Checked pcv valve and noticed the valve was lower than the grommet. Fixed the grommet so it and the valve were sitting just below the valve cover Could a loose pcv grommet cause a vacuum leak? Im also replacing the pcv hose cus it was rock hard Sorry for the long story but I know every detail is important when diagnosing
Well sucking air is only going to do a certain amount. It's not going to make it make noises and clunk and stuff. Realize those vans are absolute piles of crap as they age. Depending if it's really high mileage, it's often a good idea just to get rid of those stupid things. They're really positive junk as they age, especially electronically
Lol i told them the same thing. Thanks scotty
Hey scotty when i take the pcv hose of of the intake manifold side the idle levels out, its kinda high but levels out and when i put the hose back on it wants to die and sputter. A little bit of oil and white smoke come out thru the hose also. Could i have not pushed the pcv valve down far enough in the valve cover? I ordered an oem chrysler pcv valve and the gasket feels thicker and its a little taller than the one i got from oreillys and the one that was in there originally. Also the hose is stiff in the middle but soft on the ends so i ordered a new one and the hose clamps were missing before i touched it. Are those clamps essential for optimum vacuum? Could the old hose cause it to choke out when its connected to the intake?