I installed new king bump stops up front this past week. This morning I go to my local flex spot to adjust the height of them. I drive the front left tire on top of a rock, I went a bit higher than I would have liked, the front left and back right were the only tires on the ground for a second while the Jeep rocked a bit. No big deal, this isn’t unusual for our Jeeps. However, I parked the Jeep on the rock and went outside to tighten down the front right bump stop. When I did this I heard a pop/clunk sound (sounded metallic). Hmmm… I had no idea what that could have been but the Jeep was stable and not moving anywhere. So I continued to tighten the bump. I got back in the Jeep and backed off the rock. That’s when I noticed that I now have a check engine light, the e-brake light is on when the ebrake handle is all the way down, and the 4wd indicator on the dash isn’t lit up. Also noticed that the lockers aren’t engaging, the indicator lights just flash.

No bueno. I pull out my OBD adapter and open up J-Scan to read the codes. I’m getting U0414 and P0463. I tried resetting the codes but they kept coming back. Typically I’d just disconnect the negative on the battery to do a hard reset but I had only my spanner wrench, no 10mm. Whatever, I’ll drive the Jeep home and reset the modules later. I start driving and the engine just revs up… no shifting to second gear. So now I think I have a bigger problem.

Still, I drive the Jeep home at 25mph in first gear (can’t even shift it manually). I disconnected the battery for about 20 minutes and while it was disconnected I see that I have a wire bundle that was pinched between the frame and the pitman arm. The pitman arm doesn’t contact the frame even at full lock, but it does get very close with the big bore psc box. I repair 3 broken wires. I haven’t confirmed this yet but I believe they’re can wires from the auto sway bar that’s removed. Anyways, I fix the wires and reconnect the battery. Still, I have the same two codes and all the symptoms as described above.

Why am I writing all this? Mostly to vent but if you guys have advice then I’m all ears. This is my first Jeep and it’s been a love hate relationship. The Jeep is super fun and capable but it’s still a dodge at heart so it has its issues. I go to read about the codes on alldata and it can be a broken wire or a faulty module. Unfortunately I don’t have a gazillion dollar scanner to test each module through the CAN so now I just get to inspect a bunch of wiring and hope I see the issue. Otherwise the Jeep is going to a shop since I can’t test modules and I’m not the type to just throw parts at a problem hoping for a resolution.

So… here we are with a wheeling trip planned for tomorrow that’s now cancelled and a broken Jeep. I guess instead of wheeling I get to work on the Jeep. This is somewhat of a common thing for me. I cancel about a third of my wheeling trips due to something happening. Not all of it is faulty Jeep/Mopar stuff, some of it is working on it since I’ve added so many things to it. I guess it’s just a Jeep thing?

 

https://www.jkowners.com/threads/201...istake.351714/

So, this guy decided to bridge his wires on his locker sensor. Although I pinched the wires, I think since we have exactly the same symptoms, my tipm may also be fried. I’ll open mine up and see if I see anything crazy like a burnt chip. As long as it’s not a programmable chip then I think I can replace the single chip and not toss a tipm over something small.

 

There is a lot of flex in the body and frame of the jeep, when building you need to have good clearances between things. Its a jeep thing, the heavy modding and rough treatment we put our jeeps thru can cause some headaches. Sometimes I wish for a jeep with a 3 wire motor and now canbus. I fucking hate that computer crap on a crawler.

 

That is true, there’s a lot of flex in these frames and bodies. I will say this is the most modified vehicle I’ve had. But I’ve had Toyota’s in the past that I’ve abused far more than this Jeep simple because I know that I can replace a part in an 80’s Toyota for only a few bucks. This Jeep is quite a bit more expensive so I don’t beat on it like I did my Toyota’s in the past. I definitely have a love hate relationship with this Jeep because deep down, the Jeep knows I wish it were made by Toyota. Overall, I can’t complain too much. It’s a machine like any other and requires work and maintenance. I would say I’m about finished with the “build” on it so as this point I think I’m still finding bugs and kinks that need to be worked out.

 

So, I believe my TIPM is good as far as my bench testing goes. I pulled the tipm apart down to the circuit boards. Every logic gate, resistor, and capacitor appears to look okay. I say okay because I’ve yet to see a fried resistor, capacitor, or logic gate that didn’t have external evidence of it being bad from a short which is what bridging two wires would do. Each pin on the board was clean and corrosion free. I also tested all 11 relays on the board, all coils measured within spec of the datasheet at around 150 ohms, when I applied power to the coils of the relays, there was a clear audible click which shows that the relays are opening and closing. I wasn’t able to test for power coming out of the switch pins since I was probing very small solder joints on the board and there’s not only little room to work with but also I only have two hands. Either way, all circuitry inside the tipm appears to be okay, all relays that plug into the tipm near the fuses are good and all fuses are good. I’ll reassemble everything using dialectric grease and connect the battery hoping that the power being disconnected for a day cleared anything silly. Next step of troubleshooting if this doesn’t work is to look at the transmission control module and the transfer case position sensor. Maybe some continuity tests along the harness to verify I didn’t pull a wire apart somewhere else.

Did I mention I hate my Jeep sometimes?

 

So you are a Ruby?? If so go into JScan and simply disable the sway bar and see if that problem occurs still. Then re-enable and try. You may have done in the 5V power supply for the signal wires to the SB in the damage but usually you are pulling 5V hot circuits through the ECM to ground to activate the signal so all that would do is activate the circuit spearately. But try the deactivation as that might at least isolate where to really look.
Just to ramble - further to Dirtman's post if I could find a wind up window, no powerlock JKU I am pretty sure I would buy it and strip it to nothing and rewire it so that it does not need an ECU to operate. Hardwire everything but keep the Chev engine and tranny ECU's as I like the engine, the power and the economy. I mean you want AC, push a button and it manually turns on and does not need air deflectors and sensors everywhere, just a pressure sensor and it gives cold air. Turn on the wipers and they go, not some bunch of lights flashing and other crap goes off. Turn on headlights and they come on regardless of what bulb or fixture you run. You guys get the hint here.

 

I do have a rubicon. The sway bar has been taken out and disabled a long time ago. I’ll enable and disable again just to rule it out once everything is buttoned back up.

I don’t think so much that the problem is the wires and sensors. I’m all for technology. I just wish they made it a little easier to diagnose for someone who doesn’t have a $10k scanner. If a high dollar scanner can read signals and diagnose if a specific module is bad then they can easily add codes to the system to display on a regular OBD2 scanner that anyone can read. That would help me diagnose this problem much easier. I’ve worked on creating test solutions for flight control hardware by using software. So I know that there can be a CAN scan created that would indicate where the signal breakdown is. If the CAN is good then the test can go further to diagnose an individual component and report that back with a fault code through the OBD2. But no, they only want mechanics with a hundred grand or more in their tool box to work on these things.

 

I finally got back to having time to work on the Jeep. I replaced the TIPM and everything works as it should. I did modify the wiring harness that runs from the locker switch, locker sensor, fog lights, and sway bar. I removed the fog light wires and the sway bar wires since they’re useless to me. I also re-routed the harness so it won’t get pinched again.

When time allows I’ll dig into the old tipm again and check more components on it. I wasn’t able to tear it down as much as I’d like to before since I had to cut some glue and pull the logic board from the distribution board. I didn’t want to do that without having another tipm on hand in case my tipm wasn’t bad. Turns out my tipm is bad and I’m free to dig into it without issue now.

 

I've fixed that harness twice myself.

This was the second time. Smashy smashy.

 

I don’t understand how you smashed it there. I notched my frame there for drag link clearance, my wire harness in that position is more vulnerable than yours and I don’t see how I can smash my harness there. During my repair I did remove some excess wires which thinned down the bulky mess. I also pulled the harness up a bit and zip tied it towards the front/top of the cross member. The harness on the passenger side is pulled up a bit as well to limit any contact it may have with the drag link under full flex.

If I have another smashed harness there I’ll probably take apart the whole harness up front and completely re-route it. Replacing an expensive tipm due to a smashed harness will get old extremely fast.