Hey everyone,

I just joined this forum, but I have been looking through this forum for a week searching for anything I wanted to know about fixing my truck, and I have been very successful in finding the majority of the information I want. There are a few questions I have that are still unanswered.

1. I am going to be replacing the dash and the heater core. While I am at it I am going to fix what I think is a blend door problem. I always get air blowing out of the floor, but very little through defrosting vents. The vent selector does nothing and I hear something drop/move when I turn on the air. From what I have read on here I think it is the blend door. My question here is, is there more than one blend door in my 97 Ram 1500? I have read gdstock's and de8212's post about replacing the dash so I am confident I can get the dash out easily. I will be using the HeaterTreater to fix the blend door.

2. I am looking into getting aftermarket rims. Currently I am running on stock rims. What is the largest size rim I can get without having to lift the truck? What is the largest size rim I can get without throwing off the speedometer? I want to get the largest size rim and tire without any clearance issues on a non-lifted truck. I'm not a fan of a small rim and a huge tire. I like them to look normal/proportional.

There are a lot of other things with the truck that I am going to fix/replace, and I plan on documenting the entire thing with a writeup for everything I do. Probably a couple videos here and there as well. After I fix the dash and all of that I will be moving on to the door locks (the electric door locks do not work) and the windows (they roll down very slowly and the driver side window has been known to fall down on its own). I will of course share everything with you all on here, and I am sure I will be coming back to ask more questions.

Thanks for your help!

 

Rims don't got much to do with how tall your truck is...Are you also buying new tires?

The only rim that'll fit on your stock tires are what's labelled on your tire, most likely 16x7 (you can fit different width rims as well I think, like 16x6). If you want bigger rims, you need new tires. For example 33/12.50/16R size tires means you can fit a 16" tire (usually 8"-10" wide). 33" is as tall a tire as you'll wanna go...if you get wide rims, you might need to get a level kit/spacers to avoid rubbing.

Also the only thing that'll throw off the speedo is getting taller tires such as 35" tires. To fix that, you can buy a programmer/tuner that has speedo calibration. Or you can take it to a dealer/shop and have them do it. Or you could do it manually I believe: http://www.go.jeep-xj.info/HowtoSpeedoGears.htm
Hope that helps.

 

Welcome to the forum!

because youre new to the forum, you should download the Factory Service manual from the 2nd gen FAQs/DIY section. maybe get a hanyes or a chilton manual too. these things will help you find procedures and info about any repairs you do to your truck.

for your question about the wheels- you could go up to pretty much any rim size you want, the only thing is that you would have to get lower profile tires to avoid rubbing.

 

Changing tire size up or down will throw your speedometer some. Just go to a shop and have them reprogram it in your computer with a scan tool. I have Mickey Thompson 315 75 R 16 on mine. ran it for a while stock but it did rub. put a 2'' leveling kit on and wheel spacers. No rub now. if you are getting rims just get step rims so you dont have to fool with spacers, I dont like mine and am gonna get rid of them at some point. Leveling kits are cheap and very easy to do.