And then they'll wonder why TOYOTA will take over the truck market.!!!!!!!!!

 

It's not a total flop but like you said, at least the Cummins lugs better and the .75 ratio 4th would be perfect for the Cummins where the .69 is sometimes too tall. With the Hemi, after a few rolling hills, it learns that it needs direct drive and will stay out of O/D al long as I either keep a load on or let off completely to let it hold back in 3rd with the TC locked while going down hill. But if I give it a light throttle it thinks I have a light load and it shifts back to 4th and I start over again. Instead of it learning what I want it to do, its too much like I have to learn what it wants me to do.

 

You discribe that vary well Hannable. You gotta learn what it takes to make it work. But theres no way you can didle you foot to really controle it. A good auto will allow you to lock into all gears. Theres no way they'll ever get smart enough to be in the right gear ahead of time by themselves. there going to do what your foot feed tells them too. And that will be constant change up and down shifting.
You see they really cant sence the load. what there senceing is the foot feed telling it to go and it cant because of the load., so it downshifts. let up on the footfeed and it upshifts, wont stay in the lower gear because its senceing the load., the load is still there. It sences the action of the footfeed. Man I'mm mixing myself up now. You just gotta be able to lock them in the desired gear.

 

im with bluepp i want to be able to lock out 4th! just had a trip with my 5th wheel 12,000lbs through the moutains with lots of switchbacks and sharp curves and the constant shifting was horrible i would have rather left it in 3rd because i never got over 50mph

 

They won't!

 

Houndog,
They wont what??

 

Toyota won't take over the truck market.

 

Hounddog,
Man I hope not but it sure ticks me what they done with this lockout. The more I read the different sites the more I read about guys complaining of gear hunting.

 

I had a v10 with auto several years ago. It downshifted too often and I took it to a dealer. There was an adjustment on the throttle linkage that he adjusted that helped the tranny shifting. I wonder if the new CTD has that adjustment?

My truck at www.GoRowan.com/2004ram

 

It seems to me that the smartest way for DC to avoid these little messes would have been to put a 4th gear position on the gear selector in the first place! You get a button for tow/haul mode, a "P" for park, a "R" for reverse, a "N" for nutral and 1,2,3 for first through fourth gear for crying out loud! How hard or expencive could it be or to put a "4" on the stinking thing in the first place. Must be the Enginering degree that the guy has makes him think that we could not figure out what gear we would need so they did it for us.

 

Houndog,
Just read a article about the japs comeing with 370 hp and 700 lb torque diesel pickups. All I can say is competision is good but I still will preffer the Dodge cummins, but not with this setup of no lockout.
Tchwab,
The dealers tell me they did it to give better fuel milage??????,, because so many guys were towing in 3rd all day and that droped fuel milage ???? Ya right, sacrifice the trans for fuel milage. When you got dealers and engineers thinking like that, the japs will be taking over the towing market.

 

I just test drove a 05 3500 srw and asked the salesman about this and he pointed out the button at the end of the shifter which when pressed did have an effect on the tranny and seem to stay locked in or out.

 

When your running down the road in 4th and push the tow haul button it shifts back into 3rd, and raises all the shift points up to a higher rpm. but then as soon as theres no load on the truck it goes back into 4th . You cant lock it into 3rd and make it stay there. So if you got a hilly area up and down and your trying to maintain a steady speed , your going to be on and off the throttle and the trans will start hunting between 3rd and 4th. This is nothing new all autos have done this and this one does too !! Just read the articles from the guys that have pulled in these road conditions with this 2005 48re. You just gotta be able to lock out 4th if you want it to operate properly.

 

bluepp's right
i know because i own one