97K miles, well kept. Problem started a year ago.Intermittent stalling even at highway speeds, hot, cold, dry, wet, doesn’t matter. Sometimes restarts itself, other times you have to shut it down and restart. Sometimes it won’t. Went to dealer, no reports or recalls or service notes. “Never heard of that problem” – liars, it’s all over the web. Fuel pump ok, wiring ok, alternator ok, changed crank shaft sensor (didn’t help). Web has lots of stories of woe, no real solutions. Now I’m told it is one of the main computers (514AB) but I can only find one source, “refurbished,” on line, for $250 and they won’t take it back if it doesn’t work. Car has now been sitting for four months with no solution! HELP! I’ve been unemployed for 18 month and I need to be able to get to interviews.
Do you have the V8 or 6 cylinder? Is the check engine light on? It could be something as simple as a bad MAP sensor. You can go to almost any parts store and borrow their code reader for free.
If you really do need a new computer, I would go to a junk yard get get one. Cherokees are very plentiful there and you could probably find a working computer for around $20.
It’s the 6 cyl. and there is no Check Engine light lit. The only code it has shown was a very general error referring to the “Primary” and that was replaced, but still comes up as the only read out. I haven’t had the erratic electrical problems that many with this model have experienced – gauges and lights going crazy – but when the stall happens it will crank and catch for a second then stall again, or crank and not catch at all.
We have a '96 V6 (~224K mi) that had a failure-to-shift gears problem at highway speeds and other times (then ~150K mi). The only way to stop the problem was to get off the road, turn the car off, then start it again. We’d get back on the highway, and the car would shift fine for the rest of a 100 mi. trip that we took every weekend. At first that always worked, but then became less effective–longer stop time required. Our mechanic told us that we needed a new transmission, so we went to a recommended transmission shop. They kept the car, drove it as we described, but couldn’t reproduce the symptoms consistently enough to, as they said, justify a new transmission.
We never had check lights come on during this time. What solved our problem was replacing the battery. Our regular mechanic told us that Jeeps sometimes have weird problems when a battery is old. We’re still driving the car on the original transmission and with the replaced battery. I know the problem we had doesn’t seem that it might have had any relation to your stalling issues, but who knows.
Thanks for the tip. It’s worth checking into. Low voltages to many devices makes them “stupid” so I’ll check into it.