1996 Cherokee XJ 4.0L

Greetings fellow Jeepers. Total noob here looking for help with my crank / no start issue.

Apologies in advance for the long story. This is my 5th different no start issue in the past 5 weeks. Never worked on cars before then. Can’t afford to pay a pro to fix it, so I’ve had to learn how to do everything myself via this forum, Haynes manual, and YouTube. After many new parts and over $700, I’m still stuck.

(Was also leaking oil all over the place from the oil filler cap; replaced cap; no visible leak since then.)

1. Bad battery terminals. [Replaced terminals] Started up again.

2. Dead Idle Air Control Valve (P0505). [Replaced IAC, air filter, throttle body gasket; cleaned throttle body] Started up again.

3. Hard cold start. Bad spark plugs / ignition system components. [Replaced plugs, wires, cap, rotor, cam sensor, ignition coil] Started up again. Ran fine while I burped the cooling system after deleting Heater Control Valve (which had exploded). Put in reverse to take for a test drive, stalled as soon as I hit the gas. Refused to start again (P0340).

4. Killed battery by constantly trying to crank her up for weeks on end while barely driving it. [Replaced battery] Crank / no start (P0340).

5. [Replaced Crank Sensor] Crank / no start. No trouble codes when scanned again. Tested for spark. No spark from ignition coil to distributor cap.

Thought it might be a bad ASD relay, but that wasn’t it.

Finally surrendered and towed it to my local repair shop. They said they can’t fix it, take it to the Chrysler dealer; said my ECM is bad / needs to be replaced but weren’t very clear as to how they came to that conclusion. Something about an issue somewhere along all my electrical wiring frying the computer. Said it would take several hours of labor just to pinpoint the issue. Tech said his fancy scanner just told him what my $40 scanner did: P0340. Called the Chrysler dealer to tow it there and they said don’t even bother. We won’t be able to diagnose your issue and probably won’t have the parts you need…go kick rocks.

No idea where to go from here. Any insight would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, y’all.

How's the fuel system? Pressure in PSI, noids that say injectors have power, and fuel actually shooting out injectors?

Then there's CPS/CkPS sync...

My suggestion is that you get a Factory Service Manual and return the Haynes Manual.
Pacific Coast Manual is what I found and it is very helpful and won't kill your wallet.
This manual has diagnostic steps to check problems. section 8D covers no spark...

Hope this helps

Yeah, the Haynes manual seems to be very generalized. Thanks for the link, BruceB.

I honestly haven't spent much time on the fuel side, since everything so far has been electrical. She cranks forever, but refuses to spark. I thought it was the wiring harness that goes into the coil. Some of the wires look pretty gnarly, but the tech said there's no short there.

What bout the 30 amp fuse to the asd relay or I'm not sure if my 96 has a pcm fuse I got crank no start on that as well but haven't had chance to go over it but my 99 in her pdc block the pcm fuse slot is wore so every once while if I hit a bump too hard I gotta get out and reset it I mean being a 96 there's not telling what little quirks it's gonna have js

P0340 is the camshaft sensor.


I dunno, maybe test the camshaft sensor? It's hiding in the distributor.

There are quite a few videos on YouTube about how to test it.

UPDATE: Thanx for the input, y'all. I kept hearing about how finicky the 4.0 engine is with the crank sensor, and people kept telling me to go with the Mopar one, not another, cheaper brand. Still wouldn't spark after installing the OEM one. I finally surrendered just over a week ago and took it to an auto electric wizard. Turns out I had 2 issues. The distributor itself was shot, and there was a short in the wiring harness between the cam sensor and PCM. Picked her up after they repaired those issues and she ran great for a week.

A couple days ago I felt like it was idling a bit high and rough, like it was before doing the tune-up. Then it gave me a hard start one night after starting fine a few times earlier, throughout the day. Next day, first start, took about 3 tries to start up. Slapped on my OBD2 scanner: P0505 (Idle Air Control Valve). Same issue I had 2 months ago. One of the first parts I replaced when this whole saga began. Wondering if it's a parts quality issue and if I should replace the after-market IAC with the OEM one. Also felt like my MPG was down so I'm thinking about going ahead and doing RnR on the O2 sensors. Not sure whether to get NTK, Denso, or Bosch. Maybe I should also RnR the TPS while I'm at it? And maybe even the MAP sensor as well?

I wouldn't be changing out too many things at once. Bad or failing O2 sensors can affect fuel mileage. OEM ones are NTK.
As far as an IAC many here are using a Standard Motor Products, Inc (SMP) one with good reports. I've had one in my '96 for maybe 7-8 years.
https://www.rockauto.com/en/moreinfo...180314&jsn=843

Thanx, EZEARL....NTK it is!

That Standard IAC from RockAuto is the one I put in a couple months ago.

Every part/sensor I've replaced so far has been beyond fried...extra crispy. I imagine my O2 sensors will be, too.