About a month ago my 1998 2.5l Ranger just died on the road. Running fine, it just stopped. Got it parked and it would not restart. Had it towed to the house where it sat most of the next day and then it I tried to start it and it fired and ran fine for about a block and it died again and would not restart. Let it sit for a moment and tried it and it fired and ran fine. Ran fine for about two weeks and died on the interstate. After it rolled to a stop i sat for a minute, cranked it and it fired. Died on me again Thanksgiving and would not restart, resulting in another tow. Putting in a new fuel pump relay did not fix it. This morning it cranked and fired. Died again on the interstate. After a couple of minutes it fired and I got it back to the house. And then I realized this: when I turned the key to the on position and the check engine light did not come on it would crank and crank and not fire. If, when I turned on the key, the check engine did lite it would fire and run fine. That's the only constant that I can find in all of this. Has anyone else faced this? I'm almost scared to drive the thing.

Have a bird that would run the fuel pump at key ON. Crank then, and it would never start. Wait for the pump to finally turn off the 'prime', and it would start and run fine.
The computer was replaced... no bad caps found... and now it works.
I would suggest you are losing the 'fuel pump' on signal somehow. You could put a test light onto the power to the pump and see if it is turning off.(because the computer forgets?)
Any way, listen for pump run at key ON. If it keeps running, the computer is on the way out. I think.
tom

Found the problem. The CEL - check engine light - not lighting with the key on means the PCM is not powering up. The first place to check is the PCM power control relay. Cheap and easy fix. The truck has been running fine ever since.