Help 4runner v8 died 1500 miles from home

icole

New member
I'm typing on my phone and this is long so I appologize. Today pulling my 18 ft. Travel trailer in Nebraska on our way home to philly from Denver. The car ran fine most of the time about 2500 miles ago it started losing power for a split second usually during acceleration. It was rare but coming into dodge city is started doing it a lot and I had to slow to 60 and it cut out a lot. The dealer in dodge city did a 200 diagnostic and found no codes accept an old fuel pump code, so they replaced the fuel pump and relay for 1000 more. If made it to Santa Fe but once there it happened once, so I changed plugs then I drove 600 trouble free miles then it started again going up a hill from crested butte to Denver. I decided to head straight home and take it to my mechanic at home. It was doing it a lot leaving Denver but I had gone almost 150 miles without issue then going 80 mph the engine cut out and didn't come back I coasted to a stop put it in park turned the key and nothing no click the engine doesn't turn over. The battery is good. Everything electric seems to work but turning the key has no effect.
 
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It's an 05 v8 with 73000 miles. I did the timing belt before starting this trip. When the engine cut out the check engine light would flash on for the split second but there were no codes she. I put the code reader on. Today waiting for the tow truck the. Code reader just kept cycling between reading and error. I checked the Ecuador fuse it was fine. I disconnected and reconnected the battery still nothing. I did notice that the display where the clock is backlighting dimmed when I turned the key to try to crank it but no relay click.
 
Losing power during acceleration sounds like a problem with the ECU, or more specifically the wiring going to the ECU. I had a supercharged tacoma that did that, turned out to be an ECU fuse. In your case I would look at the wiring to the ECU to be sure that its actually getting power.
 
As silly as it sounds, its probably your battery, battery connections or alternator.. I strongly believe its not mechanical failure.

When the battery dies in these things they do very weird stuff..
 
...I did notice that the display where the clock is backlighting dimmed when I turned the key to try to crank it but no relay click.
This symptom points to a bad battery or a discharged battery due to a faulty alternator. I would do some troubleshooting here to start with and at least get some evidence that it's ok to rule it out.
 
The radio hvac and lights all work, and I disconnected and reconnected the battery. The terminals were clean. The battery is 5 years old but it seams to work.
 
The radio hvac and lights all work, and I disconnected and reconnected the battery. The terminals were clean. The battery is 5 years old but it seams to work.

absolutely replace the battery.. When mine was dieing I was getting an intermittent code for ECU failure. I thought i was done for. Changed the battery, never a problem again. also 05 v8
 
I vote battery... 5 years is really pushing it. These newer cars are so loaded electrically that they need good, smooth power all the time. Have you measured battery voltage with/without vehicle running?
 
The serpentine belt was rubbing on the cam position sensor wire and it shorted.

That happened to me as well after the shop I used did my timing belt, the misplaced the routing of one of the wires and it shorted. Brand new sensor free. problem solved.
 
A loose battery connection or a ground wire will do the same. It can also cause the battery not to be charging and a low battery will show up with all kinds of problems. Good luck, wish I were closer to help, keep us posted. never mind my respone didn't post when it did you already found the problem!
 
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Glad you found it so quickly and can get back on the road. Hate it when little things like that happen. Agree the wire was not routed correctly post TB job.
 
So glad you found the problem, nothing worst than being a long long ways away from home and having mystery problems like this happening!!

It's one thing when away on a trip to have something fail that an relatively easy fix like an alternator, belts breaking or blowing a water hose, tire blow outs, etc. which is still very frustrating, but when it something so vague and mysterious and totally disabling your vehicle that even the "experts" at the Dealership can't find and fix the issue correctly sorta leaves one feeling at an utter loss and at their wits end!!!

How was the sensor wire issue found to be the problem?
 
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So glad you found the problem, nothing worst than being a long long ways away from home and having mystery problems like this happening!!

It's one thing when away on a trip to have something fail that an relatively easy fix like an alternator, belts breaking or blowing a water hose, tire blow outs, etc. which is still very frustrating, but when it something so vague and mysterious and totally disabling your vehicle that even the "experts" at the Dealership can't find and fix the issue correctly sorta leaves one feeling at an utter loss and at their wits end!!!

How was the sensor wire issue found to be the problem?

All you would have to do is plug in Techstream and try to start the truck and you would get the p0342 indicating bad sensor. I've had that same error before when I forgot to plug in the sensor.
 
All you would have to do is plug in Techstream and try to start the truck and you would get the p0342 indicating bad sensor. I've had that same error before when I forgot to plug in the sensor.

What is a Techstream? Is it like a code scanner?

Also, does anyone know why this engine didn't throw the p0342 when he was driving having problems. Is is because the miss was so infrequent?
 

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