Hi Everyone!

I am thinking about picking up a 93 dakota with the 3.9 and 2wd. The mileage is only 64k but there appears to be some rust and the current owner says the rear leaf springs are cracked. How bad is the repair of the leaf springs and is there anything else I should look for?

Thank you!

 

Leaf springs or leaf spring shackles or leaf spring hangers? Overall you got two possibilities. First that whatever part of the leaf assembly rotted and broke, in which case I'd run from that truck. Second, it just broke for an unknown reason and not because of rot. It's not a super hard repair to replace leaf springs but you gotta have a grinder on hand to grind off bolts and expect to replace the shackles. Also you'll need new u bolts.

But I'm guessing that truck is rotted to **** in which case I'd advise you to walk away.

 

Best piece of advice, don't buy a Dakota that doesn't have a v8 magnum. The v6 magnums are underpowered and in most cases get worse mpg then if you would have found one with the v8.

Second, I wouldnt buy that one even if it had a v8 with the repairs needed only for the fact square body Dakotas are cheep enough you should be able to find one that needs nothing but a title swap.

 

That's not the best piece of advice. V6 is a fine motor. The best piece of advice is not to buy a rotted POS.

 

No point in buying an underpowered truck that gets worse mpg.

 

Agreed, but not applicable here. The V6 Dakota is adequately powered for the size of the truck and the V6 does not get worse mileage than the V8. Not substantially better, but it's misleading to claim that it gets worse MPG.

Don't get me wrong, I'm swapping for a V8, but I don't feel like I "need" one in the least. Only for towing more than a small trailer would I feel the V6 is inadequate (but at the same time i believe the brakes would be inadequate).

 

On all the groups all the v8 owners report better mpg then 95% the v6 owners. Its not misleading its a fact. The Dakotas are a heavy truck as you well know. If you want a v6 truck might as well get an s10.

But I guess we should stop here, we've derailed enough.

 

IMO the V6 has another possible advantage - longevity. It's "overbuilt", which is to say that even though its a smaller displacement V6, it uses all the same components as its big brother V8's. It has two fewer cylinders, and therefore less power, but the fact that it uses the V8-sized parts means it has the potential to live a longer life. Beefier components mean wear points have larger surface areas and therefore the motor can handle stress and wear better. From what I've seen, if you do the normal maintenance, the Magnum V6's really do last.

 

Oh no doubt. Of course it'll last. No different then fords 4.0 and GMs 4.3 they're all v6s based off a v8.

But mopars 3.9 is gutless. Where as GM's v6 isn't that far odd from a 5.2 magnum. They're actually pretty damn close in HP and tq.

There's really no point in the 3.9. The only thing it has going for it is durability and dependability. Don't even get me started on 4 ****ter Dakotas.

 

When the Magnum V6 came out it produced 175hp and 230 lbft of torque. The slightly larger GM 4.3 in that time frame (1993) made 165hp and 235 lbft of torque. How is it you consider the Mopar motor gutless when the larger GM motor managed less hp and only 5 more lbs of torque?