took it to a friends dad place and he's a mopar mechanic..anyways said there is a small leak coming from the back of the intake and said it would cost somegood money to fix.has anyone ever had this problem with thir 98-^ dakota's?

 

well not exactly, but mine was leaking from the valve cover gasket...it took some time to find the leak because it was small and in the back somewhere, but it would drop on the starter, header, and steering shaft. new valve cover gasket fixed it.

Are you positive its coming from the intake?

 

pretty sure. before it hits the ground, the last spot its on is the bottom on the trans

 

yeah, leaks like those on the back of the motor are hard to diagnose, at first i thought i had a blown head gasket, but i cleaned the block off with brakleen real good, then started it up and got in there with mirrors and things to try to see where it was coming from.

Hope i helped atleast a little, goodluck with finding and fixing the leak!

 

so you think it's probably the valve cover gasket?

 

MOST of the time, a rear leak is the valve cover gasket. However, I would keep an eye on the intake as well. It could be a rear main as well.

 

yeah im expecting it to be the intake more than the valve cover

 

im not saying it is the vavle cover gasket, im just giving you what happened to mine to try to help..it sounds like its further back on the engine then mine was...