hello everyone, i have a question about the dodge 5.9 v8. Is this engine fast? i know the ram isnt a race car but can these trucks haul *** like the 5.7 "hemis".

i only ask because im lookin for a new truck and am goin to buy dodge. i currently have a 4.0 ranger but im either getting a 90's 360 or trading in for a Hemi.

i would prefer the 90's because they are cheaper but are these 5.9's any good.
how much HP?

 

The 5.9 is a great engine and in a truck will lay down some rubber. Just got done rebuilding my brother's rearend in his 2001 Ram with a 5.9L V-8. He snapped the pinion gear in half doing a burnout and the engine is bone stock. My friends grandfather had a 98 Ram with the 360 in it with over 300,000 miles on it and ran like new and has never been tore apart. The older ones are just as good and have potential when built with the correct parts. I have a 1978 Aspen with a built 360 and man is it fun to drive. Just my $0.02 worth. I'm sure someone else will chime in.

 

I've had both, a '98 1500 RCSB 4x4 360CI and a '04 1500 QCSB 4x4 Hemi.
The reliability on both have been fine, although I only had the '98 for four years and put 68k miles on it and my '04 I've had a little over four years and have only just hit 40k miles.
The 5.9 had about as much low end torque as the Hemi but nowhere near the "seat of the pants" HP. Although there are a plethora of mods out there for the 5.9 simply because it's been around for about as long as I have. Big advantage I found with the Hemi besides the extra like 80 HP is the fact that with my '98 moving 35" tires, I got about 9 mpg in town and on trips could maybe squeeze out 12. The Hemi, with 35" tires gets me about 13 in town and 16 on trips.
Although form a reliability standpoint, engine wise anyway, I don't think you could go very wrong with either...

 

the 5.9 is okay.
the 5.7 is better, it has roughly 100 more ponies, and a properly equiped 1500 can tow up to 9100lbs. and do 0-60 in mid to upper 7 seconds (look on you tube for a hemi in action).
if you are looking for a faster truck, the 5.7 is the way to go.

 

got a 94 2500 & 5 speed. like hammerz71 said plenty of lo end torque. i've pulled loaded semi's with it. at 60 mph pulling a 24ft cargo trailer it needs more hp. to pull hills. hemi has about 345 hp to my 225. then again it might be the 365000 miles it has on it.

 

Fast? I wouldn't call it that at all. It gets crappy gas mileage and really lacks in the power department. You might can lay some rubber if you power break it but I wouldn't expect it to just burn the tires off when you put the gas to the floor. They are decent engines but they aren't fast and don't seem to have a ton of power.

 

These engines were pretty much the most powerful V8s available for the truck market until Chevrolet came out with their newer designs in approximately 1999.

Which Dodge answered with the "return" of the Hemi in approximately 2003.

They are powerful for their age, and quick. But the engine was originally designed in the late 1980s, and revised several times (the biggest one being the "Magnum" design) until it was retired in 2002. They just can't compete with the newer, high performance engines of today.

That being said, its also a lot easier to work on than the newer engines, and very reliable.

 

Actually it was designed in the late 60's with a debut as the "LA" 318 in 1967 and the "LA" 360 in 1971. These engines underwent some "tweaking" through the years, but the ones retired in '02, at their core, were the same venerable old engines that had been around for over 30 years.
But you are correct, the single largest change made was with the "Magnum" design around 1987. The Magnum 318 and 360 engines are LA engines with different cylinder heads. The blocks are physically the same as the earlier LA engines, except the oil passage for the shaft mounted rockers is not drilled, because the Magnum engines oil through the push rods. Interestingly they chose to leave the boss there, so anyone wishing to could go back to the old heads at anytime...

 

My apologies, I stand corrected. Thanks Hammer.

 

No correction, just an expansion. Most people believe it started with the "Magnum" name in the late 80's. I was just showing that the Magnums at there core were still the old "LA's".
I obviously have too much time on my hands to read....