Mileage Concern

[Jimmy07]

I’m gonna go against the flow here and say that the mileage is probably correct, and you probably don’t have a leg to stand on with the selling dealer. First off, the dealer scan tool is reading the actual mileage of the PCM, and it can’t be changed by anybody. W.I.C. probably doesn’t even have the ability to change it, and if they did, it would have to be for a good reason, and it would be documented. Second, diesels aren’t tuned via PCM swaps, so if someone swapped PCMs, it was for the sole purpose of mileage tampering. So between buying a new PCM, programming it, getting a different cluster and programming that to match, you’d have spent more money altering the mileage than the difference in selling price for the mileage difference. And third, with a cluster swap, everything from the donor vehicle is retained. This includes mileage, hours, trip odometers, user vehicle settings, AND trailer mileage.

Here’s what I think happened. The previous owner probably swapped in a 7” cluster at some point, and sold his original cluster to recoup some of the cost. Then, when he sold/ traded in the truck, wanted to keep the 7” cluster to sell/install in new truck, so he sourced a cheap 3” cluster and corrected that mileage, but didn’t reset the trailer tow miles. None of which is illegal or mileage tampering

 

[G-Ride990]

I’m gonna go against the flow here and say that the mileage is probably correct, and you probably don’t have a leg to stand on with the selling dealer. First off, the dealer scan tool is reading the actual mileage of the PCM, and it can’t be changed by anybody. W.I.C. probably doesn’t even have the ability to change it, and if they did, it would have to be for a good reason, and it would be documented. Second, diesels aren’t tuned via PCM swaps, so if someone swapped PCMs, it was for the sole purpose of mileage tampering. So between buying a new PCM, programming it, getting a different cluster and programming that to match, you’d have spent more money altering the mileage than the difference in selling price for the mileage difference. And third, with a cluster swap, everything from the donor vehicle is retained. This includes mileage, hours, trip odometers, user vehicle settings, AND trailer mileage.

Here’s what I think happened. The previous owner probably swapped in a 7” cluster at some point, and sold his original cluster to recoup some of the cost. Then, when he sold/ traded in the truck, wanted to keep the 7” cluster to sell/install in new truck, so he sourced a cheap 3” cluster and corrected that mileage, but didn’t reset the trailer tow miles. None of which is illegal or mileage tampering

Does trailer tow mileage follow the cluster? I know oil life doesn't. So maybe other things don't either. I think your idea sounds entirely plausible. I would do the same thing if I sold my truck.

 

[silver surfer]

I swapped my base cluster for a premium cluster on my 2015 Express 1500. I had the premium cluster reprogrammed to reflect correct mileage and run/idle hours. I never did anything about towing miles because I never thought about it. I was surprised to see the correct towing miles appear on the new cluster. Those miles must automatically transfer to the installed cluster while odometer and engine hours must be physically reprogrammed to match.

 

[14RAM4X4]

... So between buying a new PCM, programming it, getting a different cluster and programming that to match, you’d have spent more money altering the mileage than the difference in selling price for the mileage difference. ...

The OP posted a pic of his cluster with 137K tow miles and 33K total truck miles. The price point between a 33K mile truck and a 137K mile truck will be significantly more than $2000-ish it would take to do the above. Just a quick jump on Kelly Blue Book for a 2016 3500 crewcab 6" bed, standard equip, silver, and in Good condition shows a difference of almost double.

33K miles $33K - $37K trade in value
137K miles $16K - $19K trade in value

That's more than enough incentive for someone to go through the trouble of doing. Even if we got ridiculous and said it cost $5000 to alter the mileage, some ass hat would try it to get an extra $10K + in their pocket.

 

[22hemi13]

The OP posted a pic of his cluster with 137K tow miles and 33K total truck miles. The price point between a 33K mile truck and a 137K mile truck will be significantly more than $2000-ish it would take to do the above. Just a quick jump on Kelly Blue Book for a 2016 3500 crewcab 6" bed, standard equip, silver, and in Good condition shows a difference of almost double.

33K miles $33K - $37K trade in value
137K miles $16K - $19K trade in value

That's more than enough incentive for someone to go through the trouble of doing. Even if we got ridiculous and said it cost $5000 to alter the mileage, some ass hat would try it to get an extra $10K + in their pocket.

Yes it’s a known fact some hot shot guys will do this. Absolutely worth the time and money it takes to pull interior and parts for them.

 

[clay282]

WOW! How did I miss this thread? Changing gauge clusters has been going on forever. I had a Chrysler Lebaron with a digital cluster back in the day and it died, the new junk yard cluster showed 15,000 miles less. Then when I thought they were tamper proof in the early 2000's, riding in a coworkers Silverado, he had a switch installed to shut TOTAL power off to the gauges. No power = no mileage. Check fuel level, temp, speed etc, hit the switch and it lights up and shut it off all before 1 more mile got recorded.

If swapping gauge clusters wasn't STILL to this day a viable way to fudge the mileage to your favor, then why is there so many gauge clusters on Ebay with the miles listed? I mean, if the computer will update the cluster, why would they bother putting the mileage the cluster has, in the description and charging more for lower mileage clusters?

https://www.ebay.com/i/372283373048...&rk=7&rkt=30&sd=232636385384&itm=372283373048

 

[Jimmy07]

WOW! How did I miss this thread? Changing gauge clusters has been going on forever. I had a Chrysler Lebaron with a digital cluster back in the day and it died, the new junk yard cluster showed 15,000 miles less. Then when I thought they were tamper proof in the early 2000's, riding in a coworkers Silverado, he had a switch installed to shut TOTAL power off to the gauges. No power = no mileage. Check fuel level, temp, speed etc, hit the switch and it lights up and shut it off all before 1 more mile got recorded.

If swapping gauge clusters wasn't STILL to this day a viable way to fudge the mileage to your favor, then why is there so many gauge clusters on Ebay with the miles listed? I mean, if the computer will update the cluster, why would they bother putting the mileage the cluster has, in the description and charging more for lower mileage clusters?

https://www.ebay.com/i/372283373048?rt=nc&_trkparms=aid=222007&algo=SIM.MBE&ao=2&asc=20160908110712&meid=86bee97a5fe84d9190a90250989ec44c&pid=100677&rk=7&rkt=30&sd=232636385384&itm=372283373048

The vehicle’s computer does not correct or update the mileage. When you buy a used one, you have to send it to a company and give them the truck’s mileage that it’s going into, and they will correct it. The reason they list the mileage, is because people want to buy one that’s close to theirs or a little over, then they’ll wait for their truck to hit that number and swap it in to avoid paying to have it programmed.

 

[bshown]

The real issue here is the miles apparently are not also logged into the PCM. If they are, the Ram dealer and Mopar (because the dealer made a tech case and supposedly sent them the data) can't access them. So obviously trailer towing miles are not logged in the cluster either otherwise they would be less than the 33k miles shown on the odometer. I cannot see miles driven in the PCM datalist with my scantool. With the OP pcm showing 5000hrs of runtime, its pretty obvious the truck has at least the 137k towing miles and then some.

 

[Jimmy07]

The real issue here is the miles apparently are not also logged into the PCM.

They sure are. See post #32.

 

[bshown]

I feel like this is the PCM pulling miles from the odometer via CAN and not a value actually saved independently by the PCM, but I can't be 100% sure on that. I'd love to have access to a Ram factory scantool to see. If it was stored in the ECM like hours are, I feel like the hours would match also. I also feel like if actual miles were stored in the PCM, it would be a datalist value that would be readable on all the other scantools also. Regardless of all of this, the OP HOURS are off by what, 4000 hours cluster vs PCM? That right there is enough to know it's been tampered with.

 

[bshown]

My other technical question I am curious about. Where would the trailer towing miles be stored? Obviously it's not in the cluster, it's not a data value that just anyone can see in the PCM. So is it stored independently in the trailer brake module and it logs miles? That would be my guess as I see no way the PCM really knows there is a trailer connected or not except through communication with the trailer brake control module. Would be nice if there was some data on this in the repair manuals but I couldn't find any.

 

[clay282]

That's an excellent point on the trailer brake module possibly storing info. I was planning on installing 1 eventually and watched the YouTube video on how to install. I remember thinking the module itself was pretty big and wondered why it was so large in comparison with the last aftermarket controller I had.

 

[Bock]

I had my instrument cluster replace on my truck under warranty, the dealer put me in a rental and my truck was out of service for about a week, I had about 8500 miles on my truck. When I got my truck back the mileage and tow mileage where right, but my truck show 0 hours. So this tell me the PCM dose not keep hours.