squirt721

Hello all,
I find myself in a bit of a predicament. Driving down the interstate, cruise control on, when BAM, the car bucks. Cruise control shuts off, but it stays running. After that I choose not to use cruise control but the bucking continued every few minutes. The rpms dip down 500-1000, the speedometer dips ~5mph (although that thing waves around anyways from time to time), and my oil pressure gauge plummets briefly. I couldn't tell whether the transmission was trying to switch gears or if the engine was losing power & being turned back to life by the motion of the car.
This isn't the first of theses sort of symptoms: Making a right hand turn into work, the car would try to stall but giving it more gas or none to begin with would make it stop. Not an immediate issue I thought. Now, there is an 80% chance that if the car is moving and the wheel turned a little right, it will cut off. If i'm quick though, I can throw it in neutral and save it. I'm not sure if the bucking and this stalling are related, or if I just can't get going fast/long enough to buck at all (I can't get out of this parking lot without turning right).
I've been searching for a remedy on here and so far I've tried:
-Tried to stall in park (I can't)
-Tried to stall in drive with hand brake on (I can't)
-Tried to stall by jiggling all the wires near the steering column (I can't)
-Removed the horn relay (supposedly related to PCM)
-Tried to stall by jiggling the wires going into PCM (or at least the computer-looking thing next to the air box)
-Moved around the adjuster on the throttle valve cable (or transmission cable or kickdown etc...)
-Tilted steering wheel all around (no effect)

It might be worth noting the my speedometer needle will occasionally do a little dance for me whether I'm moving or not. Then again, it's been doing that for years and it rarely seemed to affect drivablity. Also, the TPS is probably only a year old.
Thank you all in advance for your help. Even a temporary workaround would be great so I could at least get it to a mechanic back home.

2001 Cherokee Classic
Automatic
180-something thousand miles
Bone stock

Rogue4x4

Turn left. Next question, please.



Start by checking all your grounds. This doesn't mean opening the hood and looking at them. Go to all the major ground points, remove, refresh, replace.

See what happens, report back with results.

ReadyToMount

I would check your transmission bolts where it connects to the engine. I had that problem once. The whole tranny was twisting, but wouldn't think that is your problem being you tested it under load. I would venture to say it is a wiring issue. May be hard to pin point. Obviously. Keep doing it until it is consistent so you know exactly what move is causing the stall.

EEVEE

Had a friends jeep do similar stuff check the battery connections his was so loose it kept dying out on him till he tightened them up and now it went away and hasnt come back since.

LadyKenai

this is just a guess but ignition switch in the steering column needs adjustment or a connector lose

marc

jordan96xj

Many of the post important ground connections are on the right side of the engine (same side the battery is on). A right turn would make everything want to shift left a little. I think you need to clean, check, and tighten all of those important ground and battery connections, particularly the ground connection from your negative battery terminal to the chassis (fender).

BlueRidgeMark

There is a common thread in these posts: Check the basics. Clean up your grounds, check your connections.

We always want to look for some silver bullet "replace this part and presto! all better", but often it's just doing the basics that solves the problem.

These beasties are very picky about grounds and getting good voltage. I don't know why, but I know it's true.

Like the man said, don't look at them, take them apart and clean them. Also, on your battery connections (both + and -), don't just look them over. Tug on them, yank on them, get rough with them. They might look just fine and be rotten inside.

squirt721

Hello again! I apologize for being absent for almost a week now, but I haven't been able to get to a computer.

As it turns out, the issue was a broken wire. After two days of parking lot troubleshooting, I crawled under the car, to find a wire appearing to hang a little too low. Not too much, but it was laying on some kind of linkage running into the side of the transmission. A clip broke which normally held the wire (which runs to the speedo sensor) close to the underside of the car alongside the transmission. Following the wire, it was clear it kept getting slowly ground away by the front driveshaft. Every time the dang thing would swing and touch metal, I guess it would ground out the computer. A few zipties and I was back in business! access isn't too great for a real repair, but that'll make it that much more rewarding maybe.

Thank you all for your time and suggestions. Thankfully I don't have to go cleaning every connection just yet though.

MoparNJeep

How much gas is in your tank, see if it does it with half a tank or more

CurrySoSpicy

Ouch, get on repairing those wires ASAP.

texastaz38

I would get on fixing those wires before moving the jeep again. EVER seen a burnt out jeep from an electrical fire. GOT ONE! Parts only now. Was a 2 door 93 w/ 4.0 auto, lifted 3.5" and only had 78K miles on it. Electrical short from a poorly installed aftermarket stereo. FIX IT NOW! pictures available of what NOT to do.

Texas TAZ

BlueRidgeMark

What he said.

And of course, that particular fire didn't end with a corpse inside. That's been known to happen, too.