We, have had various FCA FILES OPEN. Oil has become diluted with diesel requiring oil change after only 4-5K Miles. This gives engine premature wear and leads to engine failures. The extended warranty will be over at 100K kms, which worries the heck out of me! Emissions system (exhaust filter) would not go into regen mode even when I ran it on the highway at 120km/hr for almost 1 hr without stopping! We have had many problems with the emissions system, intermittent engine light, since the truck was new.
It's been back to the dealer too many times, (20-30) who have at times have been dishonest/or lie. During cold weather for years we have had smell issues where the truck exhaust would put out very bad odors and the dealer started telling us they could not smell it. One cold morning before initial start up (which would always smell bad), I used a different vehicle and thus picked up our dealer head mechanic brought him to the house and fired up stinker! The mechanic told me that yes, he could smell something different, but it was not the normal bad smell that was familiar to him and that he had no clue what the problem was! When he returned he told the service manager he smelled nothing! HOW FRUSTRATING IS THAT?!
It is a requirement for the dealer to reproduce and acknowledge smells before they allow warranty work even though the truck had been there umpteen times with that problem. So, anything intermittent becomes hell to solve and a big game. When I confronted both the mechanic and service manager he finally admitted that he had smelled the foul odor. He later stated that he thought it was a smell coming off the lake?? They are not always honest!
After years of ongoing problems they ended up contacting the FCA technical people at Chrysler where they were told to open the exhaust manifold, clean it, and change the internal filter, which they did. That same mechanic indicated that it was hardly dirty but since then the foul exhaust odors seemed to have disappeared... Although we have yet to experience cold weather! Every other brand of diesel truck seems to have an accessible intake manifold filter system requiring interval cleaning/changing except the Ram Ecodiesel which requires manifold + removal! (A big job).
A D V E R T I S E M E N T S
We, have had various FCA FILES OPEN. Oil has become diluted with diesel requiring oil change after only 4-5K Miles. This gives engine premature wear and leads to engine failures. The extended warranty will be over at 100K kms, which worries the heck out of me! Emissions system (exhaust filter) would not go into regen mode even when I ran it on the highway at 120km/hr for almost 1 hr without stopping! We have had many problems with the emissions system, intermittent engine light, since the truck was new.
It's been back to the dealer too many times, (20-30) who have at times have been dishonest/or lie. During cold weather for years we have had smell issues where the truck exhaust would put out very bad odors and the dealer started telling us they could not smell it. One cold morning before initial start up (which would always smell bad), I used a different vehicle and thus picked up our dealer head mechanic brought him to the house and fired up stinker! The mechanic told me that yes, he could smell something different, but it was not the normal bad smell that was familiar to him and that he had no clue what the problem was! When he returned he told the service manager he smelled nothing! HOW FRUSTRATING IS THAT?!
It is a requirement for the dealer to reproduce and acknowledge smells before they allow warranty work even though the truck had been there umpteen times with that problem. So, anything intermittent becomes hell to solve and a big game. When I confronted both the mechanic and service manager he finally admitted that he had smelled the foul odor. He later stated that he thought it was a smell coming off the lake?? They are not always honest!
After years of ongoing problems they ended up contacting the FCA technical people at Chrysler where they were told to open the exhaust manifold, clean it, and change the internal filter, which they did. That same mechanic indicated that it was hardly dirty but since then the foul exhaust odors seemed to have disappeared... Although we have yet to experience cold weather! Every other brand of diesel truck seems to have an accessible intake manifold filter system requiring interval cleaning/changing except the Ram Ecodiesel which requires manifold + removal! (A big job).
- DAN G., Point Edward, ON, Canada