Killed my truck - what to get?

[Forrest Nearing]

it SHOULD have a 48RE, but I wouldn't put it past Chrysler to have put some 47RE's in some early HO's



if you take the VIN to your local Dodge dealership, they can give you the whole option list of the truck

 

[TJarecke]

Could you get an HO motor with an auto in 03?

 

[LBARTLETT]

I don't believe you could until 4. 5

 

[RankRam]

Yes the 03 HO's do have the 48RE.

 

[Forrest Nearing]

yes, 03/04 HO's were 305/555 and came with the 5600 or 48RE instead of the 4500 or 47RE. at 04. 5 all were HO w/ 6sp or 48RE

 

[RVTRKN]

If you buy a new one, beware the German G-56 manual six speed. The transmission is apparently okay but the dual mass flywheel/clutch assembly has proven troublesome under working conditions.

Where is your proof of this, mine has been just fine with the truck unloaded weight of #9500 GVW, in city driving and OTR operation. The G56 has a good reputation as far as I'm concerned, and would buy another with it if I have the opportunity again. This is not your first posting of this, yet you don't provide any proof.

 

[JJPage]

Harvey - your mileage sounds pretty nice; I'm pretty smooth on the throttle when I'm looking for MPG - is your truck an auto or stick?



TJarecke - that's what sucks... losing a $5,500 transmission - I probably won't even be able to slurp the Mag Hy-tech double-deep pan off of it. I am going this Saturday to pull the Cool Black Hose and the PSM CAI off, along with my B&W Turnover Ball hitch and brake controller.



That drivetrain had 229K miles on it and it was still going strong - love that truck.

Why not buy your totaled truck from the insurance company, pull all your goodies off, for your new truck, then re-sell the totaled truck for parts?



Just a thought of what I will do, if my truck ever suffers the same demise as yours.

 

[CStewart]

I'll second JJ's idea, when my 92 Dakota was totaled by Farmers I bought it back from them and sold it for twice what they wanted for it. You might be surprised how little it would cost you to buy it back.



Chris

 

[Regcabguy]

What?

Where is your proof of this, mine has been just fine with the truck unloaded weight of #9500 GVW, in city driving and OTR operation. The G56 has a good reputation as far as I'm concerned, and would buy another with it if I have the opportunity again. This is not your first posting of this, yet you don't provide any proof.

I agree. A Dodge engineer who was in on the testing and development of these trannys/clutches posted on here of the trouble free performance and longevity under stock power and stock load. I'll concede that Dodge built these to hold no more than probably 30 hp over stock. The NV 5600 trucks seem to hold about 100 from what I've read here. Most of us have accepted that an aftermarket clutch is inevitable with bombing,overloading or bigger tires. This publication offered an article explaining in detail the virtues of this transmission while also pointing out the limitations of the DMF. I dumped $4500 into my '99's transmission and knew that a with new one it would probably take more doubloons to get rid of the slushbox characteristic of a factory auto.

 

[BKWelliver]

RVTRKN: I wish I was as fortunate as you. I am on my 3rd Clutch & Flywheel in my 2007 Dullie 4X4. It is bone stock and I use it twice a month only to tow my 21 foot Seaswirl Striper that weighs maybe 8000LB fully loaded. my first clutch fell apart in the first 800 miles I owned it. the next one made it 3,800 miles before it gave up. My third one has managed to make it 30K now but it is starting to act up also. I have been fortunate to have it all done under warranty. I am seriously going to do away with this piece of Crapp clutch assembly when it is on my dime. What I find completely frustrating is I had bought an all Black Sport 1998 Quad Cab short box 4X4 right off the showroom floor ten years ago with the NV4500 5spd Stick and I put almost 200K Trouble free miles on that truck. Owe and the first clutch in that truck made it 100K before I had to change it out, and I used the crap out of that truck towing on and off road with 34" tires. I traded it in on my new one in january of 2007 and I have had a raft of issues with this new truck. The clutch has only been the tip of the Ice Berg so to speek with this new truck. When I am done with this truck, I am definitely going back to Gas.

 

[CPittman]

OK, I'm going tomorrow to look at these two trucks:



Higher miles, already has the Turnover Ball hitch...



Almost exactly like my old truck, lower miles, higher price



What should I offer for each of these? Which would you pick?

 

[LBARTLETT]

I would suspect the red truck might have had a younger driver with the fender flares and bigger tires, can you contact the previous owner? if I'm right I'd go for the sliver truck and offer $16k cash, again can you contact the previous owner and see what they used the truck for? another thing to look at is the exhaust, there's cummins all over this area with straight pipes and young drives getting on them all the time to hear the noise, I like the noise too however I don't want one of their trucks when they're done with it, both offer carfax, see what you can find out, I would just be a little spooked of the red one if I was buying , let's us know how you get along

 

[Forrest Nearing]

I'd rather have a truck that was driven harder but got fleetguard filters and good oil regularly than some bone stocker that was never worked at all and had all the oil changes done at WalMart

 

[LBARTLETT]

Forrest, I agree 100%, a truck that has been pulled would be great for me, a daily commuter not so good, I think the difference is in driven hard and abused, our truck can stand driven hard very well, I drive mine hard in my opinion, what I see some of these kids do is nothing short of abuse! spinning wheels and blacksmoke at every stop light is what I refer to, there's a young man here that has a 3rd gen dually that has been set on the crazy Larry setting on his chip (like #5 race on my Juice) since the day it was new, I wouldn't want his truck but to each his own

 

[Forrest Nearing]

I definately wouldn't want that truck either. BUT... the amount of abuse these trucks will stand up to is pretty insane... I bet if that kid put the stock program back on and traded the truck in, I wouldn't be surprised if the next owner never had any problems with it

 

[RVTRKN]

RVTRKN: I wish I was as fortunate as you. I am on my 3rd Clutch & Flywheel in my 2007 Dullie 4X4. It is bone stock and I use it twice a month only to tow my 21 foot Seaswirl Striper that weighs maybe 8000LB fully loaded. my first clutch fell apart in the first 800 miles I owned it. the next one made it 3,800 miles before it gave up. My third one has managed to make it 30K now but it is starting to act up also. I have been fortunate to have it all done under warranty. I am seriously going to do away with this piece of Crapp clutch assembly when it is on my dime. What I find completely frustrating is I had bought an all Black Sport 1998 Quad Cab short box 4X4 right off the showroom floor ten years ago with the NV4500 5spd Stick and I put almost 200K Trouble free miles on that truck. Owe and the first clutch in that truck made it 100K before I had to change it out, and I used the crap out of that truck towing on and off road with 34" tires. I traded it in on my new one in january of 2007 and I have had a raft of issues with this new truck. The clutch has only been the tip of the Ice Berg so to speek with this new truck. When I am done with this truck, I am definitely going back to Gas.

I,m sorry to hear of your troubles with your clutch and wish you the best with the future miles left on it. My worst fear when I purchased my C&C is what you experienced with the DMF, when mine fails, it will get a complete SBC. Now I'm not sure which model it will be, but it will be a SBC and need to research it. Since my last post on the DMF issue, I had an miner glitch in my C&C with the with lose of power unexplained and no codes, and I immediately took it to my D/C tech where of coarse it ran perfect even with Star Scan and a road test. I asked my trany tech at the time about the DMF and has there been any issues with them. He stated that there have been a few in early production VIN's but have not replaced any since due to DMF failure. My C&C still has about 10K left on warranty and I own the D/C extended warranty so I don't know how long it will be before I install a SBC. I will let warranty replace it with what they want as long as its not my dime. I also asked my tech about the strength of the trany and will it hold up to the SBC W/O the DMF and he was not concerned about it. Not that I want to diminish the fact of your clutch troubles, because it does suck that yours have failed twice, it doesn't condemn the rest of the G56's with them.



CPittman: Take the lower mile CTD and don't forget to research the SO vrs HO and the 325/600. IMO you won't want the SO, especially if its the California version.

 

[Forrest Nearing]

I would highly recomend the South Bend FE or a dual disk... that 6. 7 can cook a clutch in no time!



if I had a G56 truck w/ a clutch failure, I'd buy a South Bend and have the dealer install it... the factory setup isn't horrible, but I wouldn't replace it with another factory setup

 

[RVTRKN]

I would highly recomend the South Bend FE or a dual disk... that 6. 7 can cook a clutch in no time!



if I had a G56 truck w/ a clutch failure, I'd buy a South Bend and have the dealer install it... the factory setup isn't horrible, but I wouldn't replace it with another factory setup

I'll take that into concideration, If it happens. Thanks

 

[CPittman]

Thanks guys - good advice all around and some thoughtful PM's - I really appreciate all the good thoughts and concern.



I did get the red "Sport" truck for $13,800. She's sweet on the inside but a little rough elsewhere. The cruise control doesn't work but on that year it's probably a vacuum leak (cruise on the '04 was via vacuum pump by the passenger side battery). Whoever owned it took the Sport mirrors off and installed Dodge towing mirrors - so there's no electric control of the mirror positions. Popped open the airbox and ess-canned the K&N filter (too dirty) and slipped in an Ea189 I was waiting to install. The "cool black hose" will go on tomorrow along with the PSM CAI.



I've already placed a call to my DTT guy. He's pricing out a single-plate DTT TC and the up-rated valve body only. I'm not going to pop for a full-blown DTT transmission at this point but I miss the hit and lockup of the DTT TC & VB.



Anyway, Merry Christmas guys and thanks for the support!

 

[LBARTLETT]

good luck with your new truck!