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Well back from the dead I guess you can say. Summer is over and its time to get back to our wonderful toys (will post some on correct forums). But to my current issue.
A friend of mine has a 1996 Dodge Ram 1500 (what a nightmare)
Now mind you, this is a farmer who feels til its completely broke, don't fix it.
We I have gotten them to change their mind set, but what a nightmare I have walked into. The biggest issue that needs addressing is the front lock out. That vaccum bugger on the front Dana 44 axle. It seems that you cannot replace just the accuator, you have to replace the whole darn setup. I have looked high and low for one, but cannot find any on a bad axle that a bone yard is willing to part with. The owner doesnot want to go new (with the current econ and all kind of makes it harder for them). I did manage to get them to go new on the Transfer case vaccum switch which was orginally what I though would had been the only issus (surprise it wasn't).
The second issue is their wonderful use of staples as fuses. They have been supper lucky that the whole truck has not gone up in smoke. I have not looked at the back of the fuse box (one inside the truck on side of dash), but are the wires easy to get out or is this a sealed unit where you have to have the whole harness with? I do know where there are a few wire cut boxes that I could use for replacements, but if its a sealed unit, then will have to hunt down a full setup.
This wonderful nightmare started off on a failing fuel pump, which turned out to be the wires not the pump at all (finding this after 2 replacement pumps as they would work for a few days then fail again). I did manage to find the TSB on this and got the replacement wires, but it has been working just fine so far. Waiting for it to fail again to replace those buggers. But it was nice to find it was no just a 96 pump only, if you remove the jumper plug you can also use a pump from a 97 or newer.
Any advice on the axle and fuse box would be helpful.
Thanks again and happy holidays
A friend of mine has a 1996 Dodge Ram 1500 (what a nightmare)
Now mind you, this is a farmer who feels til its completely broke, don't fix it.
We I have gotten them to change their mind set, but what a nightmare I have walked into. The biggest issue that needs addressing is the front lock out. That vaccum bugger on the front Dana 44 axle. It seems that you cannot replace just the accuator, you have to replace the whole darn setup. I have looked high and low for one, but cannot find any on a bad axle that a bone yard is willing to part with. The owner doesnot want to go new (with the current econ and all kind of makes it harder for them). I did manage to get them to go new on the Transfer case vaccum switch which was orginally what I though would had been the only issus (surprise it wasn't).
The second issue is their wonderful use of staples as fuses. They have been supper lucky that the whole truck has not gone up in smoke. I have not looked at the back of the fuse box (one inside the truck on side of dash), but are the wires easy to get out or is this a sealed unit where you have to have the whole harness with? I do know where there are a few wire cut boxes that I could use for replacements, but if its a sealed unit, then will have to hunt down a full setup.
This wonderful nightmare started off on a failing fuel pump, which turned out to be the wires not the pump at all (finding this after 2 replacement pumps as they would work for a few days then fail again). I did manage to find the TSB on this and got the replacement wires, but it has been working just fine so far. Waiting for it to fail again to replace those buggers. But it was nice to find it was no just a 96 pump only, if you remove the jumper plug you can also use a pump from a 97 or newer.
Any advice on the axle and fuse box would be helpful.
Thanks again and happy holidays
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