Mine goes in the shop today for the TSB work. Here's hoping all will be fixed so I can stop bad mouthing my Dakota. I am not a happy camper right now!

 

Hey everyone..

I just thought I would come back and see if this problem is being taken care of or not. I appreciate everyones words and concerns for our dilema.

Anyway as I had stated earlier I had a major problem with my Dakota and thought that I had purchased it from a dealer that actually had some sort of integrity but, after a couple of months of dealing with them I found that they were nothing more than the definition of what most people see dealers as ....crooked, money hungry, scum that in no way care about customer satisfaction or safety only about filling their pockets and the bottom line.

As I said before we were going to exchange our Dakota for something else (my wife chose an '06 PT from the affiliated dealer down the road) I wanted an '06 Dakota but they would not come anywhere near what I paid for my '05 and I would have been about $10,000 in the hole after the deal. (this coming after the "owner" of the dealership told me they would get me into the equivalent or an upgrade for little or no extra cost "because safety and satisfaction of our customers is our main goal") It took us over eight hours to get this deal done and we sat in the showroom while all of them had lunch delivered. The worst part of all this was that they had my vehicle for almost two months and when the deal was finnally done I went to get our stuff that was in the cab and we were missing the cargo net and a set of jumper cables. After asking what had happened to my items I was met at every turn with an "I don't know this has never happened before".

We spoke with the customer service rep for the dealer and she said she would not let this go and make sure that we would definetly be re-imbursed for our time and missing items and that she would not let this slide...We have not heard from her since November!!

We recently found ouselves near this dealer (we live about 70 miles away) so we decided to stop in and see if there was any "progress" and the only person that was there who remembered us was the secretary and she gave us our only token of real service or customer satisfaction we have rec'd from this dealership......A FREE CAR WASH!!!!! I did get some satisfaction though in seeing that our Dak is still on the lot and depreciating day by day.

I have barely scratched the surface of how bad our experience has been or was and I hope that none of you ever have to go through what we have and did with this truck. The real problem was that we loved this truck and it was just what we wanted and needed. This has been a very sad situation for us and it should be for the dealer and Dodge also....Instead of creating a customer for life by showing some integrity they lost a customer and after the PT (which my wife just loves) is gone we will never buy a DC product again.

For a 5 star dealership we were treated like no star customers!

 

My 2005 Dakota has been a very interesting truck. At 300 miles it just shut off while I was driveing up the road.They towed it to the nearest dealer and they fixed it in 48 hrs.I went and picked it up, drove less than a quarter mile when it quit again.Six days to get it back and several phone calls later I got the dealer that I bought the truck from to find a oxegen sensor at anouthe dealer.The dealer that the truck was sitting at told me that they were on a national back order and it could be up to sixty days before the parts came in. Okay 3000 miles the brakes start shaking the truck and I mean shaking the truck.I called my dealer and they took it right in and replaced the axles and drums that worked for a min. then back to shaking again. I called the dealer and he told me that Dodge was trying to fix the problem to keep in touch every three to four wks,I called him every week.It has to go back in for repairs as soon as I can get it there.Will see this time.NewYork state has a lemon law they'll fix it or eat it no choice.

 

Well, I've my truck back for a week or so and it is better. The service department from my dealer began to do the TSB work and then realized (after they tore it apart) that the TSB only related to 8 1/4 rear ends. Mine is a 9 1/4. They thru it back together and told me to come and pick it up. I said well, I'll come and get it when you decide what you are going to do to resolve the issue and then fix it. They came to the conclusion that they (supposedly) were not balancing the tires correctly and took it to a local Goodyear store. That seemed to the trick but, they left air in my brake lines! [:@] SO, back to the dealer it goes!!

 

I have a little over 8,000 miles on my 05 truck. No vibrations yet. I saw a bunch of you are send your truck in for a TSB. What is a TSB, is this gonna be some kind of a recall item?

 

New member here and new owner of an 05 Quad Cab Laramie AWD. I bought the truck about a month ago as a demonstrator model but with less than 7.5k miles on it. So it was still eligible for rebates & employee/supplier discount less depreciation that I negotiated. Anyway the truck had about 6700 miles when I took delivery.

I quickly discovered that I too had the dreaded 'Brake shudder at highway speeds'. It is currently in the shop for this issue as well as a significant water leak on the driver side (floor pan). They called and indicated that they found the water leak at a body seam behind the dash/on the firewall. They have fixed that supposedly and will be performing the TSB for the vibration tommorow. They said that the parts are in stock becuase they have been doing a number of these TSBs to other Dakotas.

In any case, I have a pdf of the TSB if anyone wants it. The bottom line is that they need to replace rear axle half shafts, replace the rear brake assembly kit (i.e. shoes, springs, pins, adjuster assembly, etc) and resurface the front rotors (on vehicle resurface only). The combination of these things is supposed to resolve the issue. Warranty pays the dealer 3.5 hours for this work.

I'll let ya all know if this fixes it when I pick the truck up tommorow.

 

Ill take the pdf trest@comcast.net if you can senf it off in an email. Thanks!

 

The only satisfaction I got when I found this forum tonight is that I am not alone! My 05 Dakota is in the shop as I write this for the 6th visit all relating to brake vibration. They have had the wheels off so many times the lug nut plating is worn off. this afternoon I was called and they are replacing my stock steel wheels with cast aluminum wheels claiming this will fix it. Can't believe it but what the heck, they have had our truck 15 days since we bought it four months ago. We have put over a 1000 miles back and forth as we live 80 miles away from the dealer. We have had new rear drums twice, turned twice, new rotors and turned once, new pads, brake shoes in the rear this is 3rd set, last visit was two new axel shafts, several wheel balances. What a piece of junk. We thought we got a good deal buying a 05 , but what we got was shafted, and I'm not talking about the rear axels. The dealer has been good, we are on our 5th rental car free of charge. This time a new 06 Dodge Caravan, wish we had bought one of these instead, it's Great, not a truck and not cool I know but it sure drives great. Do not know what we are going to do, the truck has 8000 mi. on it and we are so upside down now we may have to keep it forever. We are looking into the Or lemon law and from what we have read we qualify as candidates. I know I will never own another Dodge Dakota, the absolute worse car buying experience we have ever had in 50 yrs of driving, and to top it off it is our first Dodge we have ever owned. Wish we had our old Silverado back.........[&o]

 

Don't give up on the truck. They are great trucks, and for some reason, the steel wheels are what's giving the truck a bad name. The replacement of the wheels have fixed a lot of the other daks on this and other sites. I've even told my dealership about it and they said that they'll keep an eye on that.

When I first bought my truck, I had to have the rotors returned and the drums replaced because the vibrations were coming from those areas when I applied the brakes. Never had any trouble ever since.

 

A TSB report is a "Technical Service Bulletin". Check out Edmunds.com. here is what is stated under the issue of rear vibrations.

I have had my '05 for over a year now, almost 9,000 miles. I have noticed a vibration when stopping, ranging in speeds, but it always felt more like the ABS so I never really concerned myself with it. How can I be sure I can "identify" this issue correctly? Now I am paranoid and don't want to drive it, especially since it sounds like a solid solution hasn't yet been discovered. I also don't want my truck to be used as an experimental "let's see if this fixes it" subject, which unfortunately it sounds like several of you had to endure. I was there with my 2000 Neon, dealership actually overheated and blew the engine...

Hey DakotaDoug - I'll take a copy of that pdf, you can just e-mail it to saroni@comcast.net - THANKS!