this damn thing has been nothing but a headache for me..(95 ram 1500 4x4 short bed mag360 auto) First the water pump...no big deal it's got miles, then that catalytic converter...no big deal it has a few miles...the the tie rod/pittman arm...now i pull the front diff cover off to stop a small drip it had, and the side gears are shot....i got duped and i want out of the thing..anybody in the new england RI area that is interested in this truck let me know..obviously needs the spider gear pack replaced, other than that tires are good(not great)115k, typical door rust, magnum 360, auto (waiting for that to go bad haha)short bed standard cab, anything else yo0u want to know email me heatwavedave@hotmail.com ...oh yeah and it USED to be a 4x4

 

Did u buy it used??? I mean sounds like you got a truck that was beat on hardcore before you got it. Sucks for your luck though hopfeull u can get rid of it and get something that is a bit newer and less beat on

 

either that or it's just at that age/mileage where everything seems to go wrong, didnt seem too bad when i first got it now im just irritated but those front ends shouldnt do that thyre pretty bulletproof...im guessing that the guy before me knew about the dripping axle...and just kept adding to it whenever and ran it without here and there and just topped it off before i bought it......im probably just going to fix the axle get the 4wd working and send her packing to the next guy cause it really isnt worth dick without the 4wd i knew i should have bought a chevy(sorry guys)

 

ehhh I do agree about it not happening and that it shouldn't. But you really can't judge a truck that you bought used. Especially a 12 year old one. This guy could have driven around on pavement with 4x4 on just because i mean you truly have no idea. There is no way that axle should have done that at 115k The truck was in no doubt abused. Everything else that went wrong is what should be expected in a 12 year old vehicle. If you bought a high mileage 1995 chevy, ford , toyota, nissan that was beat on befoer you would run into these same issues. It's got nothing to do with the brand. personally why i don't plan on buying used vehicles anymore. cuz you just never know

 

used vehicles is all i buy, for numerous reasons...negative equity sucks, insurance is rediculous, they dont make em like they used to...ect ect ect...in reality tho im really just fed up, i really like gms better to begin with sorry again haha parts are a bit cheaper and what not, im really not knocking the truck considering everything i still think its a decent truck, i bought it knowing it needed work, but now im sick of doing it, cause if it's not one thing broken it's another really just a game of luck i did check it out pretty good before i bought it and the only thing that bothered me was teh Friggin drip figures its biting me in the *** but like i said the truck is decent and illl definately get the amount of money that im in it for when i sell it. i usually dont keep vehicles long anywas but this may be a record!

 

just curious what do u want for it?

 

My Truck is 11 years old with 98k miles on it and it runs like a mint. It had one owner before me. An older guy, who waxed it and changed the oil more than he drove it. Kept it in a garage. I haven't had any problems with it since I bought it (knock on wood). He kept a maintinace record in the back of the owners manual, oil changes every 2,500 - 3500 miles. I love it. I'm sorry to hear about your luck, for one of these trucks to be wrecked by 115k miles would require you to beat the hell out of it. I mean mine was maintained and it seems brand new, like someone opened a time warp to 1996. Now I mean if the guy before you plowed, towed, or offroaded heavily then I can understand. But it ain't a trucks fault, it's the owner.

 

I'm afraid I have to agree with Heatwavedave on this one. My wife and I bought our '99 Ram in November from my parents with 61K on it, my Dad was the original owner and he always took decent care of it (kept up on maintence, repairs, etc.) He used it pretty much for around town trips with a few trips to the desert a couple of times a year for good measure. Never hauled more than a couple of ATV's on a small trailer, the truck led a pretty cush life.

We bought it mainly to haul our dunebuggy and ATV's to and from the desert, to date we've had to change the water pump, IAC, rear speed sensor and I still have a small oil leak which has been there since the truck was a year old). As far as hauling goes it does that pretty well, fully loaded I'm probably at about 3,500 LBS though the gas mileage is abysmal (I've done a tune-up, oil change and added a round Mopar filter) and it is a very comfortable truck for road trips, guess I'm just a little disapointed by the way the truck is aging and with a lot of the fit and finish. And I loose sleep over when my original trans is going to die on a regular basis.

Our plan is to keep our Ram for now (since we only use it for longer trips we don't put many miles on in day-to-day driving) and eventually we'll probably replace it with a one-ton or maybe even something larger (an '05 F-450 is my daily driver).

Not trying to start a flame war, just wanted the orignal poster to know he wasn't alone.

--Kevin

 

Heatwave,

Hang in there, take some time to fully decide if you want to dump the truck. I went through a series of major fixes early in my trucks life... by 50k...spent thousands of dollars to get stuff fixed... considered dumping it off, but decided to keep it. I haven't had a problem since and am glad I keep the truck.

 

Truth is that every manufacturer has some problem trucks. In the last 32 years I've owned 1 Chevy p/u, 1 GMC p/u, 1 Chevy Tahoe (still got this one), 2 Dodge RamChargers, 2 Dodge Dakotas and 2 Dodge P/U's. My experience was the Chevy was a 66 and I beat the hell out of it, as well as my friends since you could start it with a pocket knife. Great truck, got stolen. GMC was a pile! Lots of problems finally traded it off for a new Dodge. New Dodge was great until I pulled a fully loaded concrete truck out of the mud and messed up my xfer case. Traded it off for 1st RamCharger. Great vehicle butI messed around with it to much and started having problems with it. Did keep it for 9 years and 145, 000 miles though. Sold it to a friend that was a good mechanic. He sold it at 260,000 miles for a grand more than he paid for it! My 1st Dakota was great, the 2nd one not as good, worse mpg than the first. Sold it to get my current 99 which I love. My wifes Tahoe we bought new. I can't say really if it's a bad truck or not, we've had it about 7 years now but we've spent a lot of money fixing it. 3 water pumps that I've put on. Gave it to my boys because the RamCharger they had the A/C had gone out. They sold the R/C now the A/C doesn't work on the Tahoe.. Long winded way of saying everyone gets a lemon now and then. I like Dodge trucks, but except for the Charger, the Viper, and the Nitro I don't really like their cars. We had a Pontiac before the Tahoe and I'd give anything to have that car back. 160,000 miles in 7 years and only engine repair.A hose connection on the manifold broke. This was the new body style Bonniville in 92. Trip to Lake Tahoe we averaged 33mpg. We tend to keep our vehicles a long time and if I can ever afford to get me CTD, then I probably wouldn't buy another truck again. Never owned a ford though, never really liked them but not because I thought they were bad trucks, just never liked ford much. Heatwave, if you decide to keep it, then try to fix all the small problems as quickly as you can afford it. I think a lot of people, me included tend to fix that one bad problem, then drive untill the next small problem becomes the big one. When repair work is done that way it seems like your always have to fix something then you get that feeling that you may have a lemon when really it just needs some TLC on several things at once! Anyway, good luck with what ever you decide. Jeff.