04, 05 Dodge Diesel Impressions?

I am looking into buying an 04 or 05 Dodge Ram 2500HD or 3500 4x4 with the Cummins Diesel. Does anyone have one or have worked on them? I am looking to see what people think in regards to quality and how they like them or dislike them. I really like the Cummins H.O but I am skeptical about the new Dodge auto transmission, I know alot of the older ones were crap.

I worked at a dodge dealer as a lube tech for about 6 months and got to hang around the guys that worked on them all day long for their job. there aren't that many of them that come in for repairs actually i think that is a good sign. Depending on how much you want to tow with them i also am not a fan of the auto trans that dodge puts in them. It is still only four speed and not the best built in the world and they shift a little weird. However they seem to be strong enough because i saw several that were in the 03 model that were used in work trucks, that were very poorly maintained. These trucks were all over 75K miles never had the transfluid changed and it was black as tar and smelled just as bad. When we flushed the trans's on all of them (i think there was 4 in total). It took two rounds through the flush machine before the fluid was clean enough for us to feel like we could say we did a flush. None of the four trucks had any hint of a trans problem and they were all used to tow 7-10K pounds on an everyday basis. As for everything else on the trucks they are built super beefy. and they handel very well. and ride equally well. I would say there isn't a better truck for the price. I think that the chevy duramax is better but for pushing $50K there is no way they are that nice.

HTH

Jerm S.

Yeah the duramax is nice but if I am going to buy a truck I want one that comes with a "truck" engine, and an inline 6cyl Cummins is it. I was just real curius as to how the rest of the truck holds up.

I just spent the better part of 2004 shopping for a new Crew Cab diesel.

Ideally, I wanted a truck with the looks of the Ford, the Cummins engine of the Dodge, and the Allison transmission of the Chevrolet. No such animal.

I looked at each of the Big 3, and dismissed the Dodge early on for a few reasons. #1 was their crappy transmissions. I have a friend who owns a shop, and he said that although Dodge Cummins diesel motors run forever, their trannys last maybe 40k miles, especially when hooked up to the powerful diesel. #2 was the cheap feeling of the interior, especially the seats. #3 was the small crew cab compared to the Ford and Chevy.

I really liked the looks and comfort of the Ford, but didn't want to be a guinea pig with their relatively new 6.0 diesel and brand new transmission. That turned me off.

I ended up with the Chevrolet Duramax with the Allison tranny. While the Duramax is very fast and strong, I hear about injector failures in the new LLY motor (which I have). No problems for me thus far, but I only have 5k miles on her. The Allison transmission is awesome, though.

Good luck in your search.

Bud