Dodge Durango Reliability?
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Hey. A friend of mine is wondering about the reliability. He knows that they can suck sometimes and have there problems. But does any one on here have personal experiance with one? The one he is looking at is a 2000 with 166xxx miles on it. It is in great shape body and interior wise, and runs and drives great, but he just wants to know if he should buy it or not due to reliability issues.
EDIT: also it is the 4x4 SLT version with the 4.7L V8
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166k miles is a fuck of a lot for any car... personally i wouldnt do it. there are all kinds of sites that will give you reviews on them. autos.msn.com is probably the easiest.
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From a mechanics/technicians point of view....any car with that many miles on it, there is probably about a 80% chance that it needs major work. That particular vehicle is known for suspension problems, particularly the ball joints. They will run roughly $800ish for all 4. All I can suggest is get the book value for the car, have a profesional mechanic look at it to see any major possible problems it might have, and get others point of views on it to see what other damage would be like the interior. Then figure if it is really worth what they are asking for it, if not, offer less.
Another major problem that all chrysler trucks and suv's are having is that they are going through tranny's like crazy. Dont listen to anyone who owns one and hasn't experienced needing any repair yet and will tell you that they are fine. Every single one I see that has even close to 40K on them are starting to wear and the pumps aren't flowing properly. If he/she gets it, make sure to see if the tranny has proper fluid pressure, otherwise it might need a tranny. all they have to do is just pop off the cooler line(it is going to make a mess, but worth checking) and start the vehicle. if it isn't flowing much at all, it needs tranny work. if it has decent pressure, it should be ok. if i remember correctly, it should have somewhere around 20-40 psi of fluid pressure. So far for my experience, every single one I have flushed has had absolutely no pressure readable whatsoever. my .02
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My family ownes a 2001 Durango SLT, we've had a fair share of minor problems with ours and we have like 100,000 less miles then the vehicle your looking at.
First off, the cruise control is fucked up, taken it to the dealer like three or four times never seems to get fixed.
The suspension problem mentioned above is a Factory recall... so you should be able to get that fixed for free.
Thing eats through breaks like no tomorrow.
Gets bad gas mileage.
AC has had problems.
Power Windows have had problems.
I dont know, mostly just minor shit, all of it fixed at the dealership, mostly under warranty. I woudln't buy a vehicle w/ 166k ever though. Do you realize that the guy put that on in 4-5 years? Shits gonna break...
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The factory recall was issued for only 01-03 durangos and dakotas even though all of them have the issue. Its kinda like the tranny grind issue honda/acura is having with RSX's, they only have the TSB listed for the first few months they were manufactured, yet they are still having the problem with even the new 05's.
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I used to work at a Dealership and they don't have any more trany problems than chevy or ford SUV's.... how could they when their is like 2 manu. of all driveline componets for trucks.... about the only thing that doesn't have trany problems is the ford superduty.... I would agree to have it checked out by a Mechanic thought but also with that many miles it's more than likely all interstate miles and would suggest that they are easy on wear and tear miles.
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make everything short, used vehicle, have it checked out by a mechanic. PERIOD. Preferably someone you trust and has been in the business for awhile. Not some person who changes oil and recommends air filter every 3 months (Jffiy Lbue) I mean a real shop with real mechanics.
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