Unless you live your life enjoying a company car or rent electric scooters to get around, you’re well aware of the anxiety that often accompanies a visit to the mechanic. So how would such an experience feel if your car had, say, one million miles (1.6M km)? You would imagine this is an owner’s worst nightmare and, on most occasions, you’d probably be right. However, the Dodge Ram Cummins Diesel truck that brought us here begs to differ.
Recently acquired by YouTuber Tyler Hoover, whose Hoovies Garage channel is all about buying and fixing the kind of vehicles most people would run away from, this 2004 four-wheel-drive pickup came with 995,000 miles on the odometer.
Then again, you wouldn’t say so—from the look of the exterior and the driving experience to the state of the engine bay or that of the cabin, this Dodge Ram feels like it has three times its mileage.
“The truck itself, well, it’s quite a freak!” Hoover states while cruising in the video at the bottom of the story.
Now, the explanation for the generous annual mileage of the vehicle is that its previous owner is a hotshot driver, the kind who makes urgent part deliveries to oil fields. And since the man needed to rely on his vehicle for the job, the truck got A-grade maintenance throughout its lifetime, as documented in the Carfax report, which shows some 200 entries.
Of course, the vlogger had to visit his mechanic for a good old inspection, allowing us to see what’s really going on with the contraption.
Show me the money
Naturally, there are certain differences between what the said Carfax report shows and what actually happened (e.g., the first only logged a dozen tranny checks, while further paperwork received from the dealer that sold the vehicle revealed the machine is at its third transmission).
And once Hoover and his spanner man got the Dodge Ram on the elevator, they could trace the sources of some leaks the YouTuber had noticed.
We’ll list the main culprits below, while you’ll find the estimates for each one in brackets: power steering pump ($350), timing cover ($450), oil pan gasket ($400), gearbox gasket ($300 including the fluid and filter), transfer case output seal ($125).
So, the total is some $1,625, while there are also a few other items to keep in mind, such as the rear diff—all that towing has taken a toll, but the part doesn’t need to be replaced at the moment, even though it should cost over $1,500 when its times comes. In fact, certain YouTube users have taken to the comments section of the vid to add some details they believe should also be addressed.
Even so, it’s obvious that all the preventive maintenance performed by the previous owner paid out and it looks like this truck won’t be taken off the road too soon.
On a related note, the mechanic, who, by the way, is currently also working on one of Hoover’s other cars, namely a Ferrari 456 GT (you’ll find this in the vid), mentions that trucks built after 2006-2008 have seen their reliability dropping, mostly due to emission reduction hardware constantly requiring servicing—as aptly pointed out in the clip, vehicles that are too old will fall apart regardless of how they’re treated (unless it’s a restomod, of course), so this Dodge Ram is a fine example of the sweet spot for buying a used truck on a reasonable budget.
