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1999 Dodge Ram 1500 Quad 4X4 Experience Swap
paramedic99
Member Posts: 64
I have had my 99 Dodge Ram 1500 4wd Quad for only
a few months and am interested in hearing about
peoples experiences, likes and dislikes, troubles
and solutions.
My truck is 5.2 V8, Auto with the SLT package.
Driftwood Silver.
a few months and am interested in hearing about
peoples experiences, likes and dislikes, troubles
and solutions.
My truck is 5.2 V8, Auto with the SLT package.
Driftwood Silver.
0
This discussion has been closed.
Comments
The tires suck however. I will wear these out and replace it with ones I like. Goodyear is not worth the money if you ask me.
First the truck if it has large tires, offroad packaging etc will respond more to road crown and pull to one side or the other. Naturally this should be noticed on both sides depending on the road positioning.
Things I would check/inquiry about:
1. tire pressure.
2. Balancing of the alloy wheels. Impefection could be affecting alignments. The wheel itself could be defective. This occurs from time to time and the dealer rarely catches it. You can test for this. See the Dodge II (this chat was actually filled and continued in Dodge II continued also )chat for details.
3. Steering box problems
4. alignment
I love when the dealer says we aligned the vehicle to specifications. This is as good as "We did nothing as we are not sure what the problem is" Why would a new truck not be within specifications ? Cynical but potentially accurate.
This website offers the Technical Service Data and can be helpful although I saw nothing specific regarding your problem:
http://www.ecpe.vt.edu/~dfritz/ram_frame.html
Personally I would stick with considering a tire/wheel problem if the truck has been properly aligned. Remember you can take your truck to any Dodge dealer for service.
Good luck and please check those other chats I listed. There were a couple of good tech guys with alignment problems that got them fixed.
This sensation on shiftin is barely noticable in my truck but its only got 5k on it. Perhaps it will get worse.
A question for you: why so many intake gaskets? What motor? What year truck? And what are your use patterns?
I've learned to drive around the vibration, not what I desired but I'm tired of fighting.
and some extra gas mileage to boot out of the 360, and that is nothing to laugh about, unless you need the 359 Cummins to pull the state of Rhode Island or something.
13,000 out of your Goodyears sucks! I plan changing to a Super Swamper SSR (Radial) when these Goodyears are spent, were you running on alot of gravel roads? I noticed when I was driving alot of backroads my Goodyears started going to sh*t. I plan on towing around the same size Travel Trailer (I am shopping now)4500 to 6500 lb. range, so I have been doing alot of research and talking with Dodge mechanics and people who have done the upgrades. Dodge sells a Computer Chip upgrade and Air Box upgrade that will not void your warranty, (according to my local dealer) but you need to run premium pump gas with the computer, from what I understand the computer upgrade alone is 20 to 30 ft. lbs. of torque, or another company sells the Hypertech power programmer III (www.truckperformance.com), with the Programmer you can adjust the top speed limiter, tranny shift points, gain substatial torque and horsepower, and adjust speedo for larger tires and return it back to stock settings within minutes. Our trucks come with 3" Mandrel bent stainless steel exhaust, to me it would be somewhat foolish to get rid of it, that exhaust should almost last forever, but the stock muffler is very restrictive. Flo-Pro makes a 3" in and out aluminized turbo style muffler I plan on installing very soon, probably good for about
5 ft.lbs. I am not sure if Dodge sells Headers for our trucks. If you do not plan on a significantly large tire upgrade then I would stay with the 3.55's, because if you have to tow a load like yours w/overdrive switched off and with 3.92's at 65-70 in Drive your 360 would be rapping, what tires did you go to? I feel on the highway with 3.92's you will drop a small amount of mileage because your engine is turning at a higher RPM. I think that the "Surge" thing is the transmission searching back and forth for overdrive at around 40-45 MPH because mine will do that if I do not switch it, I just make it a point not to kick in overdrive until 45 MPH. What kind of mileage are you getting now? I am getting anywhere from 10 to 16 depending on what I am doing (highway or towing).
I just finished drooling through the Truck Performance web site (I would have to do more research on the power/mileage effects before the wallet is pried open). The short headers that bolt up to the stock exhaust are something new to me. I'll bookmark it. I have had a K&N air filter in since 7000 miles,(14600 now) since the engine was still breaking in I need to run some mileage tests now with the paper one. I have used a 270 mile route that consists mainly of 55-65 mph highway and a little 75 mph freeway, with about 35 miles of city driving I have achieved 16.8 mpg twice. After putting some metal conditioner (IXL) in the engine the mpg went to 17.2 for one run. These runs are empty, when towing a 2000lb tent trailer the mileage has been between 13 and 15.8! As for the dismal tire life, yes I drive on graded dirt and newly bulldozed (sharp rocks) dirt roads a lot. I work at a large copper mine and use the truck for work, the Goodyears were only 'P' rated so I didn't expect much from them. It is hard to understand how the manuf. can get away with such junk on a 4X4. I have had 265 Pathfinders for a couple thousand miles now with no troubles. I am interested in bolt-on power as I will have to sell the truck in about three years. Some time ago I read two posts about towing on the original Dodge truck topic that that made a lot of sense, both from Dodge mechanics. First, if you are towing keep the OD locked out. Second, never tow more than 85% of the trucks rated towing capacity. I have been leaving the OD locked out until 40-50mph running empty. My trailer will be 4500-5000lbs loaded.
I also had an annoying squeek coming from the my truck which turned out the be a U-joint in front axel in need of lubrication.
These are my first two service issues. 5520 miles on the truck.
My sister just bought a 2000 Cherokee Sport and compared to my p/u it is cramped but theoretically it is better off road. I could no do without the bed however.
Good luck.
gee i wish i whined more , i would have love to have mopar buy it back and get me in a diesel ...
bmckenzie :
take a look at that exhaust again , its 2.5 out of the cat into the muffler , the out of the muffler is 2.5 and the tailpipe opens up to 2 7/8 ... i pulled of my stock exhaust at 6000 miles and put on the mopar system , it comes with an adaptor to flare up to a 3" straight thru muffler then a 2 piece 3" mandrel tailpipe , the only thing is the tailpipe in stock configuration puts the outlet back further than stock on my 98 quad short box , plus it has a square cut end , i do like the look of the stock pipe in location and the slash cut end ... solution , i cut 5 inches off the over the axle pipe , from the end the the last pipe connects to , then did a slash cut to the tailpipe , but the nice thing was my system was for the 97 down and didn't have the right type of hanger to use my existing hanger , the new one comes with the extra clamp/hanger that i would have to have bought , my solution uses the supplied hanger/clamp and eliminates the extra clamp . other way of doing this would be to cut the swage off the stock tailpipe and adapt it to a 3" and use it , but i wanted to save the old exhaust ... also removing the stock muffler is a pain , that clamp really crimps the pipe , i had to use a whizzer to slit the muffler inlet pipe in 4 places and pry it apart to get it off , there is enough room to remove the muffler and tailpipe with the rear of the truck on ramps ... one final way to increase noise and performance is to put on the muffler off the 98 up sport/dakota r/t , its a turbo style looking muffler and the sport has a 5 horse more rating ... i was told by mopar that their catback exhuast was good for about 5 horse power and 14 ft/lbs torque , it did do something , you could feel it plus its not real obnoxious like a flowmaster or a glasspack .. only drawback is i like the sound so much i have my foot in it more and my mileage did suffer ... but people do turn to look , and are surprised to see that sound from a truck ...
as far as my intake problem , i do hotfoot alot , and tow my superbee on occasion , i did tow a car from tennesee to new hampshire , with no problems and using 87 octane , i also tow an enclosed snowmobile trailer in the winter , but i guess that the intake gasket is definitely a problem as DC came out with a TSB and revised gasket after my first one this past july , i know of at least 2 other people with the same problem , telltale signs is pinging under acceleration and hi oil consumption , one guy i know used 2 qts towing his car 400 miles ...
one other note , if you tow DO NOT install the mopar computer , it advances the timing way to much and you can not put a high enough octane to not ping , it tells you in the catalog not for use in tow vehicles , but i have seen an aftermarket igniton from crane i think that you can retard only the ignition , don't know if this helps in the towing department , its was in a mopar mag this past year , also on 98 and up you HAVE to pay your dealer for 1 hour of computer time to put your mileage into the new computer so swapping back and forth is out of the question unless you have a buddy that a mopar mechanic , if you don't put in the mileage all the idiot lites come on and stay on ...
I bought the extended warranty out to 75K or 6 years for $900. Hopefully (in one right) it will pay for itself, on the other hand lets hope I never need it. I drive around 19K a year so its only likely to carry me out to a little over 3 years anyway but I would have burned up the 36K in just two years.
If your're still reading this topic after buying the diesel, congratulations! Two of my neighbors have them and I thought about it for a long time before I bought the 1500 Quad cab. I do a fair amount of short drives around the mine so didn't figure diesel was the way to go. To answer your question, no I am not a heavy equipment op. at the mine, I am the electrical & instrument supervisor at the mill for the copper mine. I purchased the truck because the company helps pay for it through the Runzheimer program , in which they reimburse me for using it as my company truck.
You referred to a larger air box in one of your previous postings, where is the best place to buy one? Can you direct me to info on power/MPG gains on this and other modifications?
When I was trading my truck in for my new Diesel,
the Service Manager told me about an Air Box made by Mopar that was better than the after market ones. The problem is if your intake draws air from the engine compartment you will gain the horsepower from the new modification, but loose
gas mileage due to the hot air being sucked in, the cooler the air the more power, that is why you get power from an intercooler on a diesel. Apparently Mopar has a new one that sucks air from outside the engine compartment, that means power and mileage, might be worth looking into. My new diesel has a disgusting amount of power and over 16 MPG so far (engine is still breaking in),
this thing eats hills in fifth gear, bring on some Powerstokes. I should have bought this in the first place.
The max tire you can fit w/o a lift on a 1500 4x4 is a 32x11.50 on an 8 inch rim w/proper backspacing, you could fit bigger, but it will hit at full compression 4 wheeling, or you can trim your fenders (bad idea). I met a guy who put 3/4 ton coil springs and rear blocks on his 1500 4x4, purchased from the Dodge parts counter, he got 2 inches out of it and easily clears 33x12.50's on 10x15 rims, he was told by Dodge that it would not void his warranty because they are Mopar parts, I do not know about that, might be worth asking about. His truck looked good, it stood about the same height as my 2500 Diesel Sport, his springs and blocks looked to be the same as mine. If you put 35's on a 1500 with an automatic transmission and without a gear change you will prematurely smoke your tranny, and loose alot of power. Buy B.F. Goodrich!
Thanks for the response on the air filter box. My 1999 pulls air from inside the right fender. The main reason I think a bigger/different air box may help is the filter on my Dodge truck (5.9L) is the same size as the filter was on my Cherokee (4L). There is an interesting article on the Four Wheeler mag. website including info. on the effects of intake air temp and HP. The results show for every 10 degrees lower temp HP increases 1%!
I read the same article it was pretty good, the one where they did mods on the Ford.
this topic is being "frozen". It will be archived or deleted in the next 10 days or so.
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