Today it was cold 25 degrees the truck started fine. I let it idle a bit and all on its own it started ramping up the idle to about 1250 as soon as I touched the brake it stoped. Its never done it before what gives? I have been battling the hot idle miss for about a year now and I am ready to give in and replace the VP44 does this sound like it could be related or should I be looking at the ECM for my troubles? Hate to drop the IP and find out its the ECM anybody been down this road?

 

sounds like you have the high idle feature flashed in your ecm, from what i understand, anytime the temp is below 30 degrees, the truck will idle up to around 1200 rpms to help warm up quicker, i have it on my truck and i like it alot

 

I have owned this truck since new and its never remember it ramping up like that before.

 

It's supposed to do that, wait till it gets below 15 and it starts running on 3 cylinders!!!

 

according to TSB 18-004-04, you need to hit the "ON" switch for the cruise control and "SET". this will bring the RPMs up to 1100rpm, hold down the "ACCEL" switch to get it up to 1500rpm, or anywhere inbetween. maybe there have been different flashes through the years that activate it differently...

RickCJ or anyone,
what is the TSB for the 3 cylinder warm up? is there one? is this built into the high idle reflash TSB even though it doesnt mention it in the description?

 

It's called 3 cylinder idle, you just enable or disable. It's not called fast idle on the 2nd gen.

 

I believe this described above is for the 3rd gen trucks. My 02 behaves exactly as Terry describes.
Scared the hell out of me the first time too!

 

So, this flash does on does Not work on a 2001.5 truck? Seems like conficting info here?..........

 

That is only available on the 3rd gens, we 2nd gen guys don't get to decide when or where our high idle comes on.

Our TSB is 18-019-01.
http://dodgeram.info/tsb/2001/18-019-01.htm


phox

 

See my post above this one.

High Idle and 3 Cylinder Idle and their respective conditions are described in detail in the linked TSB.


phox

 

Gotcha,
I had a feeling.
I am looking at some type of high idle device, it is supposed to be varaible up to 1500RPMs and seems to be reasonably priced. I know alot of folks just use the old stick on the pedal trick, but I like the electronic idea better.

 

my bad, i found the wrong TSB.

how long does it take before it begins to ramp up the rpms?

 

Usually a couple minutes.
The ECM waits till it's getting steady readings from the 3 or more sensors it gets the temps from.
Coolant being one of them, it make sure it's circulated around a bit, not getting the reading from a cold or hot spot.


phox

 

Yes it is suposed to do that and the brake will turn in off. That is why I haven't had it done. I need the brake on.
The miss at hot idle is an electrical arc in the system somewhere probably a splice have had it since new and makes the engine run like crap. ruins the APPS reset alllllll the time.

 

Which brake?

Parking Brake has no effect on the cold weather idle.
Regular brake pedal will shut it off though.


phox