I’ve been the original owner of a 2001 Ram 3500 4X4 Dually. It’s got 450,000 miles and I’ve chosen to keep everything stock since I bought it. Recently I drove a friends truck that’s identical minus the miles and quickly noticed his steering and overall control and handling is considerably tighter and more reactive than mine. Within the last couple years, he’s added aftermarket leaf and coil springs while I’ve never replaced either on mine. The front springs were part of a leveling kit and just decided to replace the rear springs as a unit rather than replace the worn out spring mount bushings. I also was told that he replaced all remaining bushings with polyurethane ones. I have no problem investing money in mine by replacing both sets of springs. Before I do that I wanted to ask the Cummins Forum Community it these components are considered a wear item or should I dig deeper into this issue?

 

I'd go to the following sections and look for steering stabilizer and the lot of front end threads.
https://www.dieseltruckresource.com/...drivetrain-90/
https://www.dieseltruckresource.com/...d-gen-only-91/

Basically, after all these miles there may be a bit of wear on the components, and that needs to be checked and addressed.
Maybe a set of quality shocks would improve the handling, but worn joints, weak bushings etc will make the truck very vague and imprecise in it's handling.
The springs as long as they aren't broken do not have such a big influence, most folks are disappointed with the harsher ride from aftermarket springs.

 

Well if you do decide on new rear springs I happen to have a set of Carli Suspension rear springs for an 01 in my shed they do ride pretty good compared to oem but you do lose some payload capacity for sure with them. I took them off when we got our fifth wheel. Willing to let them go for cheap as they are of no use to me and I no longer even have the 01. I am in the Denver area and will not ship them as way too much of a pita and expensive. I also agree with what Alpine said above. At 450k the springs could be getting soft/worn but the stuff he mentioned will make a bigger difference in handling than the springs themselves.

 

I'm not sure replacing springs will have a very large impact on steering and steering/handling feel...if you have an untouched 450K mile stock Ram, you are due for an entire front end rebuild to include ball joints, control arm bushings, tie rod ends, probably trac bar ends, etc....3500's came with pretty stout springs and leafs, unless you are hauling full loads over really rough roads, I'd work on the other stuff first....just my .02. See my sig for my upgrades.