PHEW! That's SO much better then $500... Good thing SOMEONE figured out you were right and the dealership was wrong on this one.

And I'm glad your wife still loves the Durango... and you like it too most of the time... hehehe!! I've never met a Dodge I didn't love... but then again... I'm a die hard fan.

And your welcome, I tend to be the voice of reason anyway... and I hated hearing that you were so unhappy... I had to say something to help out.

I have to agree we have some of the most awesome members here... and I'm glad you are one of them!! Keep coming back!! And post some pics of that Durango... now that it's all fixed... we can all love on it for you. LOL!!

~Amanda

 

My wife emailed me after she got to work this morning. The durango was overheating again. Its official, our local Dodge dealer can never fix anything the first time.

 

Is your anit-freeze turning colors (specifically rust color)? If so, you might have a crack allowing exhaust to get into the water jacket and depositing junk in the radiator. That would cause clogging and overheating pretty quickly. The radiator problems could just be an indicator for a bigger problem.

Take it by a good radiator shop, they should be able to test the radiator/fluid and see if there is exhaust gas present in the anti-freeze while the engine is running.

 

Hmm not sure if there is a color change or not. This happens when my wife is driving the vehicle and it goes straight to the dealer so I never get a chance to look at it. She is going straight there again after work so I won't know this time either. Thanks for the suggestion though I appreciate it.

 

Notplease,

I feel your pain. I have been a loyal dodge owner the past 20 years and stuck with it even with all the nightmares that I went through like you. My first dodge vehicle was a 85 turbocharged Dodge shelby charger. I can show you my 2 foot thick warrantied/non-warrantied paperwork on that car. It was a lemon since I drove it off the lot!! But as frustrated as I am with the car, I stuck with it as Texas did not have lemon laws in place at that time and I was a college student with a limited budget. But the nice thing is that once the warranty ran out, nearly all my problems were gone other than regular maintenance. Today, I own a 2000 Durango R/T. It did not give me very much trouble. Just minor stuff right now. In my 20 years with Dodge, I found out that it was not really nothing wrong with my Shelby charger back in the past with all those horrific problems, it was a problem with the dealership where I bought it. The service manager was problaby old school and don't know a thing about computerized electronics and turbos running on those cars. Any fixes they did to my car, created 20 more problems. After the first 2 years of living hell with the dealership, I decided to take it to another dodge dealer at another city! Luckily only 20 miles away. They fixed most of my problems the first time around. Then I moved off to another city when I went to college and the local Dodge dealership in that teeny weeny town was almost as bad as my original dealership. They created more problems than what it started out with!! I finally got rid of that Shelby to my disappointment as that car is rare and a collectible. It has been butchered to death by incompetent idiots.

But today, most automechs should be pretty much knowledgable in computerized vehicles to some degree. Before I bought my 00 R/T from this dealership "Autonation Dodge in Irving, Tx now called Bankston Dodge Irving", I did a background check on them. Checked with BBB and a few people that bought from them to see how their customer service and service department was like. Everything was cleared with them so I bought the durango from them. Since then, any problems I had, whether major or minor, they did me right. My last problem was a small antifreeze leak coming from the input tube connected to the water pump. The service advisor said that part is not covered under my extended warranty, but he did some digging and found that my water pump is covered. So he did some magical paperwork write up and had my water pump replaced which will in turn also replace that leaking tube connected to the pump. All I had to pay was my $50 deductible instead of a possible non-covered $330 repair bill. I wrote a letter of praise to the service advisor that took care of me. I also stuck with that same service advisor since the day I bought the R/T. Better to just have one service advisor as he will pretty much know your car as much as you do when you bring it in for maintenance, etc.... And build a good relationship with the advisor as well.

So my advice to you "Notpleased", If you are willing to give dodge a second chance, when you can, start over like I did, get another durango if you like what it had and how it rides when you initially bought it new. New or used doesn't matter. But don't buy it from the the dealership that is dicking you around. Find a well trusted, customer satisfaction established service department dealership. Do some background checks on them and talk to folks that bought from that dealership.

If you are not planning on replacing your durango with another dodge, I would take your durango to another dealership to do any work going forward provided you did some minor background checking with them or you just feel comfortable with them.

Best wishes,

Kensai