I've got an '05 Ram 1500 SLT with the 4.7L in it. Here's the story:

I was driving from Ohio to Colorado a few months ago when my power steering went out all of the sudden. Look down at my dash and the temp gauge was peaked out. I pulled to the side of the highway and checked it out. First thing I noticed was coolant everywhere and overflow was near empty. Further inspection revealed that my tensioner pulley broke and the belt was shreded. I got a cab into the closest town and got the parts and fixed it on the highway. Drove into town and got coolant and filled it or so i thought. Everything ran fine up until recently It has been overheating. I was on a drive a few weeks ago in the mountains and noticed the gauge was about 3/4 of the way. It was around 95 that day so i though it was due to that? At normal highway speeds the needle is about half way. Going up hills it goes a little above. If i keep it idling it will go a little over 3/4 on the gauge. Coolant is at the right level and haven't pinpointed any leaks. The radiator cap doesn't appear to have a bad seal.

Any thoughts? Maybe air in the system?

 

Could be air in the system or a bad water pump. Warped/cracked head or blown head gasket is also possible. The 4.7s take a dim view of being over-heated. Good luck.

 

You need to fix this ASAP, as stated, the aluminum heads on the 4.7 don't take even mild overheats very well. I'm doing a total rebuild on the 4.7 in my Jeep right now due to a dropped valve seat. I've never run over 220*, but have been steady at 215* in traffic or with the A/C on ever since I replaced my split original radiator with a single core from Autozone. The consensus is that running at 215-220* over an extended period caused my aluminum heads to expand and the valve seat simply fell right out!
I consider running at 215* on a system with a 195* t-stat as simply running WARM, so running HOT is going to cause issues in the short term for sure!

FIRST thing I'd do is burp the system, make sure you crank the heat up all the way to get all the air bubbles out - then see where you stand...

 

Thanks guys. Another thing I forgot to mention is that when I first take off in the morning I can hear what sounds like water moving or sloshing around. I'm going to burp the system tomorrow and go from there.

 

Sloshing sound coming from in front of the dash on the passenger side?