Diesel Pick ups

[Smelser]

NO, I am not wanting to know what Vin Diesels pick up lines are.

I have sold off my 6 liter 3/4 silverado. My parents old ford, short box short cab, does ok for towing my 318 Dirt car to the track. but I want and need a truck of my own.

WEIGH IN YOUR OPIONS, good or bad, slam a auto maker or praise them, I want to hear it all.

year 2005-current under $25,000 for sure, prefer under $20K
thinking 3/4-1 ton pick up.

diesel is a must this time around.

4wd or 2wd. the 4wd is nice, as a fireifghter and unknown weather conditions for snow and such. but if its much cheaper I can go with 2wd.
I WILL NOT be booting down the mud roads and sand dunes with a spliff and a case a beer like I use to in the silverado.

so lets hear it guys.!!


my thoughts are on the dodge cummins diesel.

heard bad things on the ford diesel with sensors and senders ect.
heard bad things on the fuel injectors on the chev duramax.

[nomansland92]

06-07 chevy duramax end of story

[LuckyHenriksen]

Cummins are great, the Dodge that is wrapped around it is terrible. Ford 7.3 Powerstroke is a great engine with a nice truck to go with it. Later Ford 6L Powerstrokes get a bad rap, but just make sure you delete or bulletproof the EGR, and other trouble areas and it will be an awesome truck, plus the benefit of a better auto trans. Check out Innovative Diesel for custom tunes, they will really wake up a 6.0 and make it haul some serious ass. I have no personal experience with the Duramax stuff

[dirtbag30]

trucks are trucks for me, we have a chevy with a duramax, a hino, with whatever the hell that toyota powered diesel thing is, and cummins (our tow trucks), and my boss has a cummins pick up. and they all break. just find one in your price range and buy it. after that little rant i would look for a cummins.
my

[flyboyx]

I have a 7.3 f350 single rear wheel, 4 door long box. I love the truck. It has around 300,000 miles. I am thrilled with it. We have been to hell and back together. If I had it to do over, I wish I would have gotten 4wd. 7.3l trucks had some auto trans problems. I went through it. The torgue converters were crappy. The vanes would crack, and come loose, and as a result, make lot of shavings that plug the trans cooler which was also a bad design. The fix is to flush the trans, change the torque converter and cooler to a newer style. I spent less than 700.00 on the fix doing it myself. My trans is original to the truck and still going strong.

My buddy has a 6 liter f350. He bought it new and takes great care of it, but has spent thousands repairing the bullshit that goes wrong one those. First it was the egr cooler at 120,000 miles. Then the oil cooler another 10k later. Then the high pressure oil pump that runs the injectors at 130k. All of this shit is in the valley between the cylinders. I is a major job to rip everything off the top of the motor to change all this stuff. Then 3 or 4 injectors shit the bed. Those are all common problems with the 6l.

Cummins engines are amazing. I agree above that dodge trucks are kind of meh....

No experience with Chevy. I guess I am thinking along the lines of a tundra for my next truck.

[Bglad]

06-07 chevy duramax end of story

This

[ELVA164]

We have a '99 Ford F350 dually with the 7.3 and an '06 Dodge 3500 dually with the Cummins. We use both for occasional daily driver use and as towing rigs for 36' and 48' race trailers.

First off, the Cummins is absolutely mind-blowing as far as torque and mileage go. The truck doesn't even break a sweat pulling an aluminum 48' trailer with three cars and a gooseneck full of gear, yet can get 26(!)mpg by itself. That said, the truck itself is miserable. Numerous ridiculous failures, constant games of "maintenance catch-up," and a general lack of certainty about what minor but seriously annoying thing will break next.

The 7.3 is obviously down on power compared to the Cummins, but it is still a great engine and as absolutely bulletproof as anything I can think of. There are a good variety of tunes available for it, but we don't go that route; we just added a small in-line tuner thing that doesn't need to re-flash the ECU. We've had MANY fewer issues with the Ford, despite its more advanced age. If we had the chance to get a duplicate of one of the trucks, it would be the Ford.

In my mind, the Ford truck with the Cummins drivetrain would be ideal.

As a side note, we have little experience with Chevy trucks personally but any experience we have had was negative.

[CabbE30]

Duramax with the allison is unstoppable. My step-father did have to get the injectors replaced but they were covered under warranty. I vote 2000 & up Chevy.

[mrsleeve]

Ok As someone that has plenty of experience with diesel powered company trucks across all 3 marques that I put 20-30k miles a year on spend 8-10 months living out of 10-16 hours a day.


What do I drive as my personally owned truck you might ask............... 04 LLY Duramax with an Allison

Cummins is great its just wrapped in a dodge shipping crate that eats front ends and will fall apart about the time the engine is broken in. Plus the auto trans suck balls

Fords in your price point are going to be well worn 7.3's with a ticking time bomb of a trans. Or a 6.0l which is a hell of a power plant (fords attempt to clone the duramax) but has its reputation. You get an early one that has been fixed right you will be ok, or a late one that has been gone over you will as well........ Good luck on that front though . AOD trans is better than a dodge but its no allison.

Anything pre 08 emissions equipment is going to be the least trouble sum No DPF to clog up, and soot burns to do, can leave them idle all day if you want with out issue, Only thing is the EGG systems can be problematic across the board. Simple delete or block it, issue is we all know this and are either hanging on to them or asking a a premium for them but you can get a decent mileage (under a 100k) for less than what your wanting to spend.

Some people call the IFS on the GMT platforms a weakness and it can be since it relies on a half shaft front axle system that is not as robust as a solid live axle. But this trade off is 100% worth it if your going to be just using it for DD/on road and mild off road stuff as the ride is not like a buck board an much more car like...... The main weakness is the lack of a lift pump in the fuel tank and relying solely on the Injection pump, and the slightly lower ground clearance they offer if you are off road. Try to avoid if you can a 00- 1st 1/2 of 04 as the LB7 is a pain to do injectors and the heads have to be pulled to do them. LLY and up are more serviceable, VVT turbo system and much have much more power, the 06-07 are the LBZ and I think the best of the durmaxes, while the current LMM is great its full of emissions BS that is getting harder to get around.

Other wise general maintenance is going to be similar with each make having its own quirks,

[Shangsta]

I have a 2000 ford f350 DRW with the 7.3 and manual 6 speed. I love it and they are bulletproof. The only issue I have had with mine is having to replace the fuel filter seals because of the new shitty diesel fuel we get. Cost all of $4 and 20 mins of my time. I searched high and low for a manual low milage 7.3 because my roomate had a 250 with the same combo that gave him 450k trouble free mile. He only did a clutch at 230k and the fuel filter seals.

[cwatt]

Cummins is great its just wrapped in a dodge shipping crate that eats front ends and will fall apart about the time the engine is broken in. Plus the auto trans suck balls

The front end story began a long time ago - back when Dodge first put the Cummins in their vehicles and didn't bother to change anything else.

'01-08 with the 5.9s are solid, and you can find pre-facelift for a very good price. Injector pumps seem to be the big fail here, and at $650+ aren't a cheap fix. As mentioned, no DPF, and manual trans option (albeit rare in Ontario - you're best to look in QC for that).

Re: the argument in favour of IFS - I would take solid front axle any day of the week over IFS. One U-joint vs four CVs, and don't underestimate good shocks for improving ride quality.

[ELVA164]

By the way, I forgot to mention that both of our trucks are manuals. Goodbye transmission worries.

[mrsleeve]

Right I have NEVER had to change out a front half shaft in any of the IFS gm trucks I have owned many of which I have bought with about a 100k miles and put nearly a 100 more on them.... If your running down the road all the time and are not using it for ranching duties or heavy construction the chances of you wearing out a half shaft if you take care of them (no hard over turning in 4x4 on hard surfaces) they will out last the Ujoints on your live axle. I think my Grandpa replaced 1 at about 285k mile on a suburban an never had to do the other side and they scraped with with about 325k on it thats all I can think of out of plethora of GM fullsize IFS trucks my family has had in the 20 years

[MF DOOM]

My step father owns a hotshot company and for the 1 tons he runs 06-09 duramaxs and has a 13 cummins. I can say that the chevys pull much better. I feel like theres a shitty throttle response on the dodge. Takes a bit for it to get moving. I know the chevys make more power so that could be it too. I cant tell you how many times weve had to put injectors in the duramaxs.. Gets expensive quick. The guy at the shop we buy parts from told me that they shit out so often because they hold all the fuel pressure at the tip of the injector and when that metal wears out it stops atomizing and just pours diesel in the cylinders. Makes sense to me but I dont know how true that is. I havent done any of my own research on the subject. But I can install the injectors with my eyes closed now :p


I would honesty go with the chevy. My uncle just switched from duramax to a new mega cab cummins and he says it pulls like a turd.

[mrsleeve]

Run a copious amount of Stanadyne with every fill, and it will help with that injector ware, they will still wear out but you should get more life out of them. Fucking fuel has NO lubricity in it since we got all this ULSD shit, when it gets on your hands it even feels dry.