Quote:
Originally posted by TomJ
That TH400 I had in the Jeep must've been made out of armor. It held up towing a 6k lb trailer accross the highest passes and in the hottest summers. That was in a 1/2 ton chassis no less. Guess they REALLY don't make 'em like they used to.
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There's two reasons that most autos don't like diesels. First, the 4 speed OD autos aren't as strong as the original 3 speeds, like the TH400 were. Before designing the E4POS, Ford put their C6 3 speed behind their diesels, and that tranny was a tank! Dodge put the Torqflite 727 behind the Cummins for a brief period in '89 and early '90 before "upgrading" to the 4 speed, with similar results.
Second, diesels run at lower RPM's than gas engines. The automatic trannies' oil pumps are driven by the shaft coming from the engine IIRC, and as a result don't get quite as much lubrication at low RPM as at high RPM. More importantly, the oil doesn't go through the oil cooler as fast, and this is coupled with the TC slipping more at low speeds. Again, I think the 3 speeds could take this better than the 4 speeds cab.
I think what Peter was trying to say was that your Jeep truck was also overloaded, but I'm not going to go there; I didn't read that part as well as he did. In Dodge's case, their 3/4 ton trucks between '94 and '98 actually have almost the same weight rating as the 1 tons. With manual-tranny trucks, the exact same axle was used on the 2500's as on the 3500's, and the same front end, springs, frame, etc were used. The only real difference was that the 3500 has training wheels. Automatic-equipped 2500's were given a Dana 70 instead of a Dana 80, but the Dana 70 is plenty strong by itself.
IMHO the big advantage a Dodge 3500 gives you is the stability from having a wider wheelbase on the back, so you wouldn't really be losing much by getting a 2500.
This has probably changed since '03 when Dodge started offering a SRW 3500, but that's a moot point, eh?
Also, no offense DJ
but a Cummins, especially with 3.54 gears, should be able to get 15mpg at a MINIMUM (I would expect more like 17 to 19 unless you BOMB the engine). What sort of mileage is the 454 getting?
And, again, IMHO the longevity speaks for itself...
DJ, BTW, even I was surprised when I saw what DIS was asking for the 6.5l elec. pump. I had thought it was in the $700 range. OTOH, the 6.2l pump price has gone up as well. The 6.2l uses basically the same Stanadyne DB2 pump that my 6.9l has (BTW, Stanadyne's USELESS), and i paid $325 for my pump a while back. The Dodge pump was even more expensive, but unlike the 6.2l/6.5l pump, it should never need replacing...gotta love inline pumps