I just bought a 1997 dodge 12v with manual NV4500. The truck is supposed to be pretty much stock. The truck seams to drive pretty good most of the time. However, the truck does not have much power going up any sort of hill in 5th gear. The truck is unloaded and going 65mph or so and I will loose speed going up most hills. This does not seam normal to me. I also have a 1992 dodge diesel manual that can be loaded and is able to at least keep the same speed up hills. what are a few things that I can check to try and find the problem?

 

Yea, that's not even close to normal.

First thing make sure the fuel solenoid is pulling the lever all the way up, then it is time to make sure fuel filter and pre-filter is clean, after that, we need to know what the fuel pressure is.

 

Thanks! I made a typo and it is in 5th gear that I have lack of power, but still does not seam to be normal to me. Thanks. I am going to clean the S&P high flow air filter tonight. I have heard that it is not good to use the K&N air filter oil in 12v dodge or risk damaging the turbo, so I have not been putting it on. Any thoughts on that?

 

I ran a drop in k+n for a while (100k miles), when properly oiled it was fine, never had any damage to speak of. I replaced it with a Wix recently, no performance change.

 

I'm not a big fan of K&N, but to each his own.

Any mods to the truck like 4" exhaust, etc?