5.7 L performance

justin13703 · Jul 4, 2019

My 08 is like that too. I’ve noticed that with pretty much all 3rd gen dodge trucks I’ve driven, they are all EXTREMELY reluctant to downshift. Sometimes I have to press the throttle nearly to the floor before it decides to drop two gears and lay you back in the seat when all you wanted to do is slightly accelerate lol. I don’t think there is a problem with your truck, just that the transmission programming on these is really bad and they want to stay in too high of a gear all the time. Diesels it makes sense to keep the rpms low, but the gas trucks just need to rev higher, and unfortunately the trans doesn’t like to let you do that.

This may be a case where a tune will be beneficial, not necessarily because of adding power, but because of being able to change the shift points of the truck.

HemiLonestar · Jul 5, 2019

CAFE standards. Get the trans into 5th gear as quickly as possible. HATE HATE HATE the factory trans programming.

boblonben · Jul 8, 2019

Midloguy said:
So, we've upgraded from a Minivan pulling a pop-up to this Ram 1500, 5.7L pulling a 24ft Wildwood. For info, I weighted the truck and trailer at a local scale today, 5040 for the truck, 4820 for the trailer. Per all the truck data I researched, towing capacity is rated at 8900 lbs. GCVR is 13,000.

So, here is what I'm experiencing. Towing in towing/haul mode.
Once the truck gets to highway speed, say 60 mph. It's into 4th gear, almost 2000 rpm. At this point, it feels like something is holding me back. Pushing down the accelerator pedal more does not illicit any more "noise" from the engine. I can maintain 60 on the level, but just any slight incline and she looses speed. At some point, I can punch the accelerator pedal down to get it to down-shift. When I do, it goes to 2nd gear, winds up and eventually gets me back up to speed.

The question I have to you other Ram 5.7L engine owners that tow is, does this sound normal? I guess I was anticipating that even at 60 mph, she'd still have some power left to increase speed or climb a small incline. She seems to be at the wall.

If it's not normal, any recommendations?

Hummm..Had a 2004 Rumble \Bee, 5.7, five speed. Towed a 6400 trailer all the time, never had this problem. Would do just fine up to about 75 (which I rarely ever ran), so am a bit confused with your problem. At 70 mine rpm was about 2600, 60 was about 1800 (too low), rev it up. Mine had 3.92 gears, what does yours have????? Can see if you have 3.55 that might be part of the situation??

Marshall · Jul 8, 2019

I was thinking gears as well, I had a 05, don't remember a problem with it, other than I spotted a loaded to the nut 1 year old black Laramie '09, when I was get a bit of service done. I pulled a heavy trailer with that a couple times, no problem

PuffTheMagicDragon · Jul 12, 2019

I was always under the impression that Tow/Haul only locked out 5th gear. It would hold 3rd for a while until it noticed you backed off the throttle and then once you’re at low load for a period of time it would drop into 4th and then into lock up.

I thought OD off locked out both 4th and 5th and would allow 3rd to lock up.

But yeah, factory transmission tuning on the 3rd gens has always been awful. Theres no middle ground between lugging it in overdrive and downshifting twice into redline.

HemiLonestar · Jul 15, 2019

PuffTheMagicDragon said:
But yeah, factory transmission tuning on the 3rd gens has always been awful. Theres no middle ground between lugging it in overdrive and downshifting twice into redline.

Which is why I'm looking hard at an 8HP70 retrofit when the money is available lol

Brando_SLT · Jul 17, 2019

So help me understand here... There are tuners on the market that adjust the programming for the engine. Are they able to adjust the transmission mapping too? Hauling a tent trailer today and I agree 100% it's crazy annoying how it dumps down to 3rd from 5th to climb a light grade when there's a whole 4th gear there.

HemiLonestar · Jul 18, 2019

Brando_SLT said:
So help me understand here... There are tuners on the market that adjust the programming for the engine. Are they able to adjust the transmission mapping too? Hauling a tent trailer today and I agree 100% it's crazy annoying how it dumps down to 3rd from 5th to climb a light grade when there's a whole 4th gear there.

For your year, yes. Any Superchips tuner newer than a 3815 will have the ability, if not the software installed (costs extra but eminently worth it I'm told) to custom tune RFE trans 04 and newer. If you need a custom engine tune, Diablo CMR can do also do trans tune but only 05 and newer. Back in the early days people who needed a custom tune but couldn't get their trans tuned would stack the tuners; load the Superchips with the trans tune (Superchips requires the OEM program to be installed or it won't work), then load the Diablo over top of it.

Redtruck-VA · Jul 18, 2019

These days the 05 pcm swap is the hot ticket. It's a drop in for the 04. 03's need the extra o2s added.

HemiLonestar · Jul 18, 2019

Redtruck-VA said:
These days the 05 pcm swap is the hot ticket. It's a drop in for the 04. 03's need the extra o2s added.

And the ability to lose using the truck for a minute or two if something goes wrong lol...swear to christ, every time I start thinking about doing it, something comes up that I need the truck.

KIDRR · Jul 18, 2019

My 04 5.7 does this even when I am not towing and just driving in steep hills. I feel like Dodge put a wonderful Hemi engine in these trucks and then gave us a **** of a transmission

Redtruck-VA · Jul 18, 2019

KIDRR said:
My 04 5.7 does this even when I am not towing and just driving in steep hills. I feel like Dodge put a wonderful Hemi engine in these trucks and then gave us a **** of a transmission

And you would be correct in my book.

Midloguy · Jul 25, 2019

So, has anyone had and ECM tune done on their 04? Did it make an appreciable difference? I've talked to three different EMC tuning companies and all three felt their tune would not really make a noticeable difference to the problem I'm experiencing.

HemiLonestar · Jul 26, 2019

Midloguy said:
So, has anyone had and ECM tune done on their 04? Did it make an appreciable difference? I've talked to three different EMC tuning companies and all three felt their tune would not really make a noticeable difference to the problem I'm experiencing.

Tuner isn't going to make the appreciable difference you're looking for except for maybe the custom trans tuning Superchips offers starting with your year. You might be able to alter the shift schedule enough that it changes the nature of how your truck tows. More than a few people have said it changes the truck vastly for the better even without adding extra power.

Redtruck-VA · Jul 26, 2019

Might have a look here. What I remember is the 04 wasn't supported. 05 was, but there were often issues.
Check out this thread to learn more about the trans options: Superchips Transmission Tuning Information

HemiLonestar · Jul 26, 2019

Redtruck-VA said:
Might have a look here. What I remember is the 04 wasn't supported. 05 was, but there were often issues.
Check out this thread to learn more about the trans options: Superchips Transmission Tuning Information

04 supported trans tuning (unless it was a real early build) with Superchips, just CMR couldn't do it for some reason. The list of shift schedules goes back to 04 on this list: http://www.mcfail.net/superchips/index.php?dir=5.7L+schedules/
2003's we got left out in the cold though lol

Redtruck-VA · Jul 26, 2019

Yes, 03 has a seperate TCM, 04 the TCM was intergrated into the PCM. 05 has a more advance intergrated TCM and has some support, but is fickle about being tuned.

HemiLonestar · Jul 27, 2019

Redtruck-VA said:
Yes, 03 has a seperate TCM, 04 the TCM was intergrated into the PCM. 05 has a more advance intergrated TCM and has some support, but is fickle about being tuned.

Fickle is better than not at all (without modification) lol

ric3xrt · Jul 28, 2019

KIDRR said:
My 04 5.7 does this even when I am not towing and just driving in steep hills. I feel like Dodge put a wonderful Hemi engine in these trucks and then gave us a **** of a transmission

Understatement of the year....special spot in Hell for the engineers who gave us the 45RFE and 545RFE

5.7 L performance

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