Ok so the wife and I took a trip to the dealer for a test drive, I had already picked out the 2 Durangos I wanted to check out. Unfortunately neither one of the D's I was wanting to look at were at the dealer, they were at "sister dealerships".

But we took out a 2012 Crew V6 that was fully loaded, the salesman was very nice and informative and showed us all the cool features that the D has to offer.

We take long trips so my wife wanted to check out the ride in the back seat, she said there was a little bit of road noise in the back. Not bad but noticeable, we then drove a Grand Cherokee with the Hemi and the noise wasn't there. The salesman told us the noise she was hearing was from the V6 as it had to "work harder than the Hemi".

That sounds a little fishy to me.

Anyways they are going to bring in the 2 D's I wanted to check out and I will go back for another look.

 

Sounds like the car gods telling you that you need a Hemi!

 

the v6 having to work harder then the hemi is 100% true, about it causing more road noise i couldnt say, however there could be differences in the driveline based on engine that cause one to deaden the road noise better than the other.

 

The V6 works harder at 18-19 miles per gallon city driving and 23-25 on the interstate! $4 a gallon sucks!

 

They actually did not have a Hemi Durango I could test so we tried a Hemi Grand Cherokee and it was noticeably quieter so there may be some differences in driveline as shrpshtr325 has suggested.

 

I take it your wife was in the 3rd row in the D. If so, she'd be sitting right over the rear wheels than she could ever be in the GC unless of course she was riding in the trunk. That would probably explain the difference in road noise more than the different engines.

 

Good point!

 

No...she was in the 2nd row seat. I think it might have been a problem with that particular unit. I still want to try a Hemi Durango as I always wanted the Hemi anyway. They have a couple of sister dealers not far from here and we will drive to on of those dealers next weekend to check some more out.

 

I've got the '12 D hemi citadel and have a '11 D v6 crew loaner (w/only 200 miles on it) over the weekend as my d is in for svc. My wife and I notice the difference in noise and vibration. I actually hear a little interior rattle in the back and seems to be more vibration through the car due to engine working harder. It's hard for me to keep the tach in the green on the highway at 60 just cruising. My hemi d is so quiet, most of the time you can whisper and the passenger can hear you easily.
--sent from my smartphone

 

All irrelevant until you drive Hemi and V6 Durangos back to back. Jeep is not a proper troubleshoot for this issue. Good luck - and for God Sake, get the HEMI