No disagreeing that it's fairly comfy, I just wish it was taller for my upper back.AJMBLAZER said:Dude, mine is like...just comfy. The wife even likes it and Big Ugly sorta isn't her style...or height. I get no complaints about us taking Big Ugly as long as I can help hoist her into it.
AH HA!
What you are reading on has to do with wheeling.... I have no idea about any of that and that, it's the drag racing and sled pulling that I know about. It's unusuall to break any D60 under those circumstances. They may be breaking them on giant rocks, I don't know, but who wheels a 25-40K worth of diesel pickup anyway? For those that you mention are using them to swap into other vehicles...regardless of their success or not, they are using them in different fashions and is falling off topic for new school vs. old school. I guess anyway. It's a Dodge only issue because they are the one's using a Cummins in front of it. It's the vibrations of the inline 6 diesel that makes that 5th gear nut come loose. Thats the only problem I am aware of with the NV4500 in any of the brands. While the 5th gear nut is a problem, it's not really Dodge's fault, I would presume anyway.
Well, on the other hand I've seen many Dodges in the range of mine get tons of miles out of stock autos at stock power levels. My auto was still in decent shape mechanically at 116K but went ahead and rebuilt it because it was so gummed and varnished up from original oil that I just decided to go through it and add performance stuff anyway. They are kind of like Th700R4's, there are ones out there that fail early, and people let everyone hear about it, but the truth is most last a long service life, but no one makes a big deal about that.
GM broke ground with the Allison, thats for sure. Ford also did a good job with the Torque Shift. Now Dodge has a 6spd auto and all three are building stout autos that are overbuilt for their intended purpose, just like a Th400 with a 350sbc in front of it back in the day. Regardless, the 4L80E did a good job behind the 6.5TD (granted, it got off light because the 6.5 is fairly weak compared to the PSD and 6BT), the e40D/4R100 did fairly well in the Ford, and for the most part the Dodge autos have done decent too.
I had a Th400 fail with about 70K on it behind a stock 454 in a C30 dually that rarely pulled much, and never anything over 5K. The previous owner of my K30 crew had to replace the Th400 in that truck at 78K. Does that mean a Th400 is a pile? Of course not. My grandpa put 340K on an E40D auto behind a PSD, that trans was supposed to be junk from the factory too.
Components fail all the time that aren't supposed to, regardless of year or brand. Autos are probably the worst (or best really) example of this.
Yep, the reason I went with an older truck was after pricing used Super Duty diesels (90% of which are former plow trucks up here), I'm leary of the 03+ Ram 2500's yet, and then seeing the price tag (with the GM A plan discount of my uncle's) of a bare bones stripper model GMC K2500 6.0L, 5 speed stick, vinyl floormats, no options but cruise, tilt, AC, and a sliding rear window truck...yowza...I ran away. It'd have been like having two mortgage payments. Just out of reach of the common man.
Besides, the dealership couldn't understand why I wanted a truck like that and they kept trying to show me the $10k more expensive fully loaded truck they had sitting on their lot...with an automatic.
I for the most part completely agree. That is why my service truck is a 1981 K30 crew. It was cheap compared to something newer diesel powered. It's fairly simple, it works well, gets the job done, and 3+3's are just flat cool.
Sounds like you had a ton of problems with yours. That is a bummer to hear. So far I've had to change a lift pump, build a new auto ( I had to push for that because I wanted perf. parts), and new A/C pump due to a leaky front seal. 144K on the ticker.Oh yeah, did I mention my '99 Ram's "humming" door locks that somehow everyone in the world could hear EXCEPT for the employees of the Dodge dealerships I took it to? A1 customer service there.
Poor drainage in the doors. Water pools inside the bottoms of the doors and doesn't drain out like it's supposed to. Dodge has known about it since at least the late 90's but has never willingly acknowledge it or fixed it. Guys who still had their trucks under warranty occasionally got it fixed but that was uncommon. My '99 at 3 years old and 33,000 miles had rust bubbling up under the paint at the exterior bottom of both doors. It was a dirt free cream puff when I got it like that too. My queries about using the body rust part of the warranty got me flat refusals and comments like I was nuts for even asking.
Not sure what the bumpers issues are but around here it's not uncommon to see a Ram of this vintage with golfball to softball sized holes in the door and completely rust coated bumpers.
you da man now i can read it better. When they to lonh I get lost and lose my thoughts. I guess i have that A.D.D. 
