In a message dated 98-09-21 14:41:52 EDT, you write:
<< >I think that Dodge has to continue to improve its trucks -- and the faster
>>the better.
>
> Iff'n ya want speed, buy a sports car. While the R/T's and all this
What I meant was that Dodge should quickly improve its trucks - especially
the Rams - in order to keep growing its market share. It is going to get
more difficult fro Dodge to do so now, in light of the new and improved
Chevy's, and Ford's shocking rip-offs (more below). Motor Trend has for at
least 4 years been sympathetic to Chrysler (at least as compared to some
other consumer press), but, in a recent comparison of the full-sized trucks
of the Big Three, even MT could not give Dodge the high marks. In 1994, the
Dodge Ram really did change the rules, primarily for two reasons: 1) more
powerful engines than competition, 2) radical departure from competition in
styling, or, to put it another way, looks. In 1999, Chevy's Vortec engines
will be more powerful than the Magnum engines (V-10 excepted); already, the
radical 'Dodgeness' of the Ram's body styling has been shamelessly stolen
and corrupted, along with the idea of a V-10, by Ford. So where is the
undisputable superiority of a Dodge going to be in 1999?
Please understand that I like my Dakota and am not anti-Mopar by any stretch
of the imagination.
>>
Just to throw in my two cents, I love my Dakota, and about the only things
that turns me off about them is that the V8's get worse gas mileage than the
others. I understand that gearing and all affects the mileage and that Dodge
still has the largest engines, with obvious exceptions (ie Ford 4.6L, Chevy
5.0L, Dodge 5.2). I used to have an 88 Chevy with the 5.7L and got usually
15.5 in town and highway averaged 21.2. My Dak is the same for the highway
miles and I've got a V6.
Please don't get me wrong, but a suggestion I would make to Dodge when it
improves it's engine would be to make the engines more efficient like Ford and
Chevydid, but unlike them, keep the cubic inches. My reasoning says a lot of
people would buy a base model 5.2L that pulled 280+ horses. It would persuade
me to overlook the gas mileage for sure:).
Mike S.
1993 V(peppy)6 CC 5-Speed
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