CTD... agreed

 

id say you answered you own question, go cummins

 

Thanks for the info on blue book being off, but still 11K is a decent chunk off, and I don't have 7K worth of things wrong with my truck but more like 7K I will need to put into it before making the trip cross country. As for my usage it's not a few occasional trips, I normally pull my race trailer at least once a month sometimes more, and considering that I only drive the truck maybe a 6 times a month that is a decent perscentage.

As for working on it, good to know about shops not wanting to deal with diesels, but then again I rarely use shops for things unless they are a big deal or I don't have time to do it myself, but if I get one I will just need to learn how to work on it...

 

CTD all the way. sounds like you'll use it a good bit, not to mention in the future, they hold value way better than gas trucks, i say get what you can out of your Hemi while you can, in a couple years when you want something new, it wo'nt be worth squat. not to mention if you had a CTD, you wouldn't want anything for a loooooong time

 

Thanks guys, I think we are going for the switch, I showed my wife this thread and she said I make good points and between this forum and another dodge truck forum every appears to agree that I should switch to a CTD. We did some searching online and she actually likes the 05 (03-05) body style a little more than the newer front-end and we found a local 05 CTD 2500 QC 4X4 that I am going to look at tomorrow.

So, it looks like 05 was a transitional year since there was an 04.5, 05, and 05.5, is there anything I should look for or stay away from when looking at 05 trucks? BTW, she also liked the fact that the truck was listed in the mid $20K range, and had a good point.

The convo went like this as we were looking at the online clasifieds:
her - "I like this one, it's almost like taking our current truck and swapping it for the CTD"
me - "hmm??"
her - "How much would it cost to swap our truck to be the same as this one?"
me - "I have no idea since it is a swap of the frame, engine, suspension and all that"
her - "Would you say it was more than 10K?"
me - "hell yeah, easily more than 10K..."
her - "Well this truck is like swapping ours for a CTD version and only 10K more, so why not go for it..."

God I love her, and her logic, lol...

 

sounds like you got a good woman there man
I would go with the CTD it will pull your race trailer much easier plus making a 23 hour drive pulling that much weight and the transmission on the HEMI will be put to the test and diesels are just fing sick cant wait to get one
It will also last you longer than the HEMI just because that is how diesels are made and the cummins is the best engine you could ever want as well so good luck and let us know how the transaction goes

 

Definitely get the Cummins. Look for a 6 speed manual. The 48RE's are a weak tranny. If you ever plan to hop up the Cummins, the stock auto won't last long.

Another feature of the Cummins that wasn't mentioned yet is the 50% better mileage you will get towing. No 50% is not a exaggerated number either. With the Hemi towing 10k you will be lucky to see an average of 8 mpg. With the Cummins towing 10k, you will see 12 mpg pretty easily. These are actual number between a buddy who has the same truck as me but with a cummins/6 spd, towing our campers together. They weigh the same and we followed each other so the trip was exactly the same. He got 13 and I got 8. He towed the hills in 6th and I towed the hills in 3rd or 2nd.

 

My truck only moves for towing or hauling as well. Pulling a car trailer Once a week or maybe Twice a week around is not killing your truck. Especially since you realy only drive it to pull the trailer.
Your $7k figure is awefully high if you do the work yourself. You gave the prices of what a shop would charge that is why I said about the diesel/shop issue.

Look man, do what you wish, but to spend an additional $10k for something that sits there most of the time AND when your truck can get the job done. i see it as a waste. just my .02
I did that and now my truck just sits. My Silverado was getting the job done just fine. Now I have a truck payment where as my other truck would already be paid for. I wish I never made the switch, so I'm speaking from experience.
Not that I don't like my truck. it's just that it sits more than I use it. i bought my rig back in March of '08. it's now 18months later and I haven't even made it to 6,700miles yet. That's averaging 370 miles each month. Kind of a waste to be paying a loan for those numbers.

 

The only price there that was including shop fees was the gear swap, I was going to have that prefessionally done, otherwise I pretty much do eveything on my vehicles and those are pretty much just the price of parts and misc expences...

I get what your saying about it sitting, that does suck, I work from home and the view out of the window in front of me is my truck just sitting there. I drive it to and from the office once a week, to random things such as Dr. appointments, and etc. because it is my daily driver, I just don't really go anywhere. I have put 68K on this truck since we bought it new in July of 05, so I rack up miles in it, but yeah on a day to day and week to week basis it just sits out there taunting me to drive it...

 

As long as you realize the good and bad then your good to go. Most guys only look at the good and don't dwell on the bad. I'm the total opposite. if you can dell on the bad and it doesn't bother you, then problem solved. Just as long as those thoughts are resolved B4 the occurrence. occurrence=purchase...lol