If I had just $400 to spend on my otherwise stock truck, I'd spend it on a tuner. If I knew that I'd be able to do more serious building (cam, heads, intake manifold, entire exhaust system) within a year or so I'd go with an SCT from hemifever, otherwise I'd go with a Superchips. If I knew I'd be doing more serious building two or more years out, I'd still go with the Superchips. On an otherwise stock truck, SCT gains you nothing and doesn't allow you to adjust silly **** like tire sizes. But if my daddy was generous and I knew I'd be doing serious wrenching soon, I'd go with the SCT for sure.

That'd be after the plenum replacement kit, naturally. I'd do that before anything else. All the bolt-on horsepower stuff means squat if you blow a plenum gasket and start sucking oil.

The real questions, the ones that have not been asked or answered, are these: What do you actually intend to do with the truck? Are you going to be knocking around in the woods or out racing your buddies on Saturday night? Are you more concerned about mileage or horsepower? Are you building a street truck or an off-roader? What sort of truck is going to best fit your young *** in the next two years or so?

 

If you take your truck off-road at all.... Do NOT use the pro-flow style filter. (and I use the term 'filter' very loosely..) Those are more about air flow, than filtering, and in an off road environment, your engine will ingest many things that it really should not. If you are a pavement only driver, that is a different story.

 

You're 17. First thing I advise is the following:
1) Read through the forums before jumping into any mods
2) Download the FSM (Field Service Manual)
3) Visit the DIY thread, atop this forum, and read every bit of it
4) SAVE YOUR MONEY FIRST, SPEND LATER
5) Get to know the truck while saving your money

 

Well where I live there are no woods. Rural saskatchewan... So this is no pavement pounder. Mud, gravel, and farming with a little highway here and there. I use it alot for just messing around in the dirt and mud when it rains and towing poor saps when they need it.

Oh also I do have to put my truck through +35 celsius to -45 as the weather does change dramatically if that changes anything

Money isn't terribly an issue. I'm not strapped for cash I just want to save some money in the long run. Thanks for the great replies. I appreciate the massive vault of knowledge you guys have!

I will start with the plenum kit from hughes as you reccomended... Now I can destroy my friends ford knowing my truck won't be breakin any time soon!

 

ya that ford will break down before your dodge !

 

What I like best about the Dodge is the amount of room in the engine bay. Your Ford friend should envy you just for that.

 

Were it mine to do, then, I'd keep in mind to stay away from the 14x3 air cleaner and go with something like the K&N FIPK with a prefilter (K&N calls them a "drycharger") on it. One of the clones will do just fine as long as it has some isolation ("heat shield") around it to keep the splashing water away. I've got the K&N myself, like it just fine, and got it delivered for $240 thanks to a price-match guarantee. Where water is a concern you don't want a paper element exposed to it. Shattered pistons are not good!

So, knocking around farm country and towing Fords out of sticks, huh? That's low-to-mid-range stuff, especially if you're going to load up the bed with significant weight from time to time, leaving street racer mods out of the equation. So in the mileage/performance realm I'd plug in the tuner, add some high quality shorty headers -- and, believe it or not, 2.5" all the way to the muffler, with a single outlet. Fatter pipes won't scavenge well at lower RPM. (Since you don't need a cat you might as well eliminate it to lose it as a point of failure. Be sure to do something to keep the second 02 sensor signal in range so the confuser doesn't throw codes.) If money's not a problem, I'd also add the ($600USD) Hughes airgap manifold with some four-hole injectors plugged into it for good low RPM atomization. I'd probably leave the stock throttle body alone, or at most bore the taper away while leaving the maximum diameter as-is.

I think the above would result in a truck you'd be happy to drive that doesn't eat your wallet. However, if after all of this you get to thinking that you'd like to drive it until there's nothing left of it, you might think about installing a beefier transmission so the relatively weak stock unit doesn't leave you stranded or limping home in a cloud of smoke.

There are a thousand and one things that can be done to these trucks to make them better/faster/stronger... it's a lot easier to run out of money than it is to run out of ideas.

 

I thought the paper filter was the way to go when going through water? At least in my Wrangler, the paper filter would soak up water and suffocate the engine before much (if any) water got in. Where as a K&N (guaze) filter would just let it through.

 

this forum = Win. Well with all these suggestions I don't know where to start! Plenum first i suppose and move on from there!

 

Start here --> 2nd Gen FAQs.