Help me out guys.........

[Jolie]

Looks like its time to replace the Dodge that my husband is driving. It, just like the other 2 Dodges that he had, dropped a tranny before 20k, big surprise there. I think a lot of it with this truck is that its not what he needs for what he's doing. He's got a 99 Ram 3500 V10/auto, dually 4x4 with a 3.55 rear end (had I known that when we bought it used we wouldn't have bought it). He's pulling big heavy trailers, but doesn't go over the 12k (according to the book) towing capacity. Most he's towed is 9k (that was our 94 Chevy 6.5L TD on our car hauler trailer).

Anyway, after the disaster last summer with the 6.5L TD he's sworn off Chevy. However, I drove a Dmax yesterday and was very impressed. Good thing I didn't drive it before I bought my Nissan Titan or I'd have a Dmax of my own. :D

So, my questions are:

Is the Dmax reliable? How about the allison auto? What kind of mileage are you guys seeing? empty? towing? Would a Dmax hold up to logging roads (rough, dusty, long), cold winters (live in Alaska), pulling heavy trailers (12k or so), just in general WORK?

He's spooked about Dodge now, but is considering a Cummins HO/6-spd manual. He's also looking at Ford PSD/6-spd manual. I'm pulling for the Chevy, I love the Dmax.........he's skeptical.

Give me some good news......has Chevy gotten their act together and built a decent truck?

We are going in on Tuesday to drive all 3 trucks.

[cabletech]

I get about 19mpg driving to work (80% highway 20% city). I get 12 to 13mpg pulling our 8k 5th wheel. I think the allison is the best light duty PU transmission you can get.

Jay

[Luke Porter]

I had a '01 that I put 90K trouble free miles on. That includes 2 trips to Alaska, one to Newfoundland and numerous shorter trips with a 14k trailer. I got 10 mpg towing, 16 not.

[matt-max]

jolie-

contact mav (or maverick). he ran two dmaxes in alaska hot-shotting and plowing until this spring, putting on lots of heavy use miles. have not seen him here for a while but you can probably find him at the diesel place dot com site

matt

[rickdlance]

I can get 20 MPG on my 2001 2500 hd 4 x 4. It has 155,000 miles on it with nothing but an injector change. My 2004 won't do that good on milelage. I tow 75% of the time and avg about 12 towing.

[tswartos]

i've drove all three new generation diesels and quite frankly either the HO six speed or the dmax would suit u fine. matter of preference on options/comfort and pocket book. Ask Hoot, he just switched from a 01 dmax to a new cummins. If it was a business decsion and based in what you've posted I might even leaner futher to cummins...money is money after all and unless u buy a hi miles used truck.

[BassinRVer]

The only bad thing about the D/A is that the loggin roads will wear out your front end parts alot faster, i.e. tierods, idler and pitman arms...

[Jolie]

Thanks for the replies guys.....

We drove the Ford and Chevy today. The Ford PSD seemed lethargic, drove 2, one 6-spd and one auto, neither measured up to the Dmax.

We didn't drive the Cummins cause the dealer sucks. Furthermore after I drove the 6-spd PSD we decided that an auto was vital and Dodge can't build a good auto, so its OUT.

Hubby LOVES the Chevy Dmax/Allison, I'm shocked to say the least. Looks like we will be ordering a 2005 here soon.

I'm a little worried about the logging roads, but I run my Titan on them with no worries. Only about 100/miles per week on them, so a total of 5k/year on logging roads.

Chevy dealer was real cool, let us take one offroad to check out the ride, WOW, its like night and day from Dodge. :D