Duramax owner here
 

Been looking at going from my 02 duramax to an 03-05 cummins. I guess I'm on here to see if I can be convinced to switch as I'm on the fence right now

welcome!!!!yeah i believe you came to the right sight to be brainwashed!!!

My biggest concern is the truck not the motor. Do these dodge trucks hold up well past 200k because a lot of these trucks I'm lookin at are up there in miles.(3rd gen)

Welcome to the DTR.

I'll try to provide a fair assessment.

I was a GM man back in the day, and I'm still fairly partial to them. They host some great options and comforts, they build a smooth truck.

A Dodge does not have the creature comforts that a chevy has, but it has the Cummins. That's why I bought Dodge, because it was a Cummins wrapped in a Dodge.

Thus far, the only dodge problems that I have had were the lift pump failing (specific to the 03-04.5 Dodges, they had a canister mounted pump that was prone to failure) and ball joints (fairly common in most 4wd Dodges, but may have been helped along by the larger tires I run.)

The 05's had a problem with plastic intercoolers. The 06's had a problem with instrument clusters taking a dump.

As far as I know, that's it. If you put some power to the tranny, it's going to fail. I know that there are a few guys that are running stock trucks and origonal transmissions, and are doing well.

It's not gonna be like an allison. The 68RFE's are good transmissions, but they are only in the 07.5's and up.

The Dodge does not rev as high as the D'max.


By the seat of the pants, a chevy is probably going to feel stronger, but I've never seen a V8 in a semi.

The motor, if properly maintained, will hold up well past 500k.

Some great info there^^^ Allison tranny doesn't do well with added power either, I've slipped mine bad and done some damage with a 90hp tune. If I do go with a cummins it will be a manual

I also like the idea of a solid front axle in a hd truck.

Well, the transmission issue is debateable... What are your plans with the truck? If you want to do any dragracing, I would not go with a stick. As long as you're not racing, you'll be good with a stick and a clutch upgrade.
The solid front axle does have it's pro's and cons.

Yea no racing here. Just wanna beable to add a little more power without having to spend 4 grand on tranny

Then a stick is where you want to go.

Ditto!! I've had a couple of friends and have known other people who just put a small power box on and fry the trans no problem...I think they are maxed out at stock HP...

That's what I figured. How does the interior hold up. Like seats, dash controls and things like that past 200K

If you take care of them, not too bad. The driver side seat foam will be shot, the carpet will probably be shot on the driver side. The dash may crack, depending on what year it is. There are a lot of wiring issues for the back doors with the wiring getting pinched in the rubber groment, but that is an easy fix.

Dodge does have a cheaper interior than chevy, but as far as it holding up, it does ok as long as it is taken care of.

Did the 03-05 dashes crack? Everything else you mentioned is minor and common in chevys as well

My dash did, but it happened after I moved out here to AZ... that's fairly extreme heat.

What year did they start the HO motor with 300/600