Performance upgrades / fuel mileage

[Barr2255]

I have 2004 dodge 2500 with a 5.7 hemi, it has a 6” lift and 35’s. Fully rebuilt front end suspension with updated power steering. The guy prior to me put a cheap lift on it and basically wore out the front end. I replaced everything and brought it up to speed so to speak. Bilstein suspension on all 4 corners.

Its basically my farm truck, also hunting rig/ do the stuff that I don’t want to do with my “nicer” ram 1500. I have another thread on that where I’m replacing cam and lifters on that truck

My question to you guys is - what performance upgrades are reasonable for this truck? I’m not opposed to getting a tuner and really putting in some work on it.

I did have a broken valve spring on it a few months back and replaced all the coil packs, spark plug wires, plugs and gaskets on intake manifold, valve covers throttle body plus cleaned the throttle body. It has about 170k miles on it and that little tune up did make it more responsive. Gas mileage is still 11-12.5 on average which is a hard pill to swallow in Comifornia lol.

Just want your guys thoughts/experiance on making the truck better performance wise.

 

[Wild one]

Hopefully HemiLonestar pops in,he knows the earlier trucks pretty well. I think the 04 is a bit tougher to tune then the 05's are ,but that's in the 1500's,not sure if that applies to a 2500 though.

 

[HemiLonestar]

Hopefully HemiLonestar pops in,he knows the earlier trucks pretty well. I think the 04 is a bit tougher to tune then the 05's are ,but that's in the 1500's,not sure if that applies to a 2500 though.

Yeah those too unfortunately. The 2003's were useless, the 2004's were a bit better (you can actually somewhat tune for a decent cam) but not quite great. 2005 was the first year where you could really tune. If I recall correctly, 2005 is how far back HPT covers with the Ram 5.7.

I have 2004 dodge 2500 with a 5.7 hemi, it has a 6” lift and 35’s. Fully rebuilt front end suspension with updated power steering. The guy prior to me put a cheap lift on it and basically wore out the front end. I replaced everything and brought it up to speed so to speak. Bilstein suspension on all 4 corners.

Its basically my farm truck, also hunting rig/ do the stuff that I don’t want to do with my “nicer” ram 1500. I have another thread on that where I’m replacing cam and lifters on that truck

My question to you guys is - what performance upgrades are reasonable for this truck? I’m not opposed to getting a tuner and really putting in some work on it.

I did have a broken valve spring on it a few months back and replaced all the coil packs, spark plug wires, plugs and gaskets on intake manifold, valve covers throttle body plus cleaned the throttle body. It has about 170k miles on it and that little tune up did make it more responsive. Gas mileage is still 11-12.5 on average which is a hard pill to swallow in Comifornia lol.

Just want your guys thoughts/experiance on making the truck better performance wise.

You can do an easy cam swap and actually tune for it, though you may not want to reuse your existing lifters at 170k. A custom tune would make it more peppy, but then you're pretty much tied to premium fuel (you might be able to get someone to tune for 89). Unfortunately you have a big heavy 2500, that's going to be your average. Even a same year ½ ton with the 5.7 is only rated 12/16.
A mild cam like a 260 or some such gives a nice shot of torque without needing another intake manifold to match with it and likely won't smoke your trans sooner than it would grenade on its own. You can get custom tuned for it (better choice) but it will actually run on a Superchips 91 canned tune (not ideal but doable). You have the infamous 545RFE trans and that is the only real weak link in your drivetrain.

 

[Barr2255]

Yeah those too unfortunately. The 2003's were useless, the 2004's were a bit better (you can actually somewhat tune for a decent cam) but not quite great. 2005 was the first year where you could really tune. If I recall correctly, 2005 is how far back HPT covers with the Ram 5.7.


You can do an easy cam swap and actually tune for it, though you may not want to reuse your existing lifters at 170k. A custom tune would make it more peppy, but then you're pretty much tied to premium fuel (you might be able to get someone to tune for 89). Unfortunately you have a big heavy 2500, that's going to be your average. Even a same year ½ ton with the 5.7 is only rated 12/16.
A mild cam like a 260 or some such gives a nice shot of torque without needing another intake manifold to match with it and likely won't smoke your trans sooner than it would grenade on its own. You can get custom tuned for it (better choice) but it will actually run on a Superchips 91 canned tune (not ideal but doable). You have the infamous 545RFE trans and that is the only real weak link in your drivetrain.

Thanks for the input, another cam and lifter job lol yay me! Jokes aside I think those are great ideas. I’ll bug ya a bit more once I get my other truck put back together early next week.

So the trans in these trucks are weak? Mines holding out pretty well, fluid still looks good not sure if it’s ever been changed but with such high mileage I almost don’t want to even service it, the clutch pack dust floating around might be the only thing helping shift at this point lol.

The dang 4wd linkage has given me the run around a couple times. I ended up fabing my own bracket and that has seemed to hold.

 

[HemiLonestar]

I had a 2003. The original RFE lasted about 105k miles. Each replacement lasted 20k or less. By 200k miles and the 6th trans I had scrapped the idea of retrofitting a ZF and just decided to get a newer truck. They were great (albeit power leeches) for the lower power 3.7 & 4.7's but putting it behind the hemi wasn't a good idea, at least not with the programming the way it was. The kickdown gear (2 prime, different from normal 2nd) uses the same clutches as the OD gears, which are the physically weakest ones in the case. To try and offset this they programmed in a significant amount of torque management into the shifts. It was barely enough trans for the early 5.7 and putting it behind the later one was an even worse idea, though by then they had finally started to learn and took 2P out of the mix.

 

[mtnrider]

You would get more performance/mpg (back) by ditching the 6" lift and the 35's then you will get out of throwing thousands of $ at the engine...

 

[DILLIGAF]

My fuel milage is perfect with my new cam and 91 tune

 

[Barr2255]

You would get more performance/mpg (back) by ditching the 6" lift and the 35's then you will get out of throwing thousands of $ at the engine...

lol well I know this! But I also use this truck to do a lot of non “on road” stuff. It goes a lot more places than my stock 2015 ram 1500. Although maybe that’s because idc if it get some scratches

 

[Barr2255]

both my trucks. The grey one has been reduced to hauling lumber and hog feed while the white one totes around the kids

 

[Barr2255]

My fuel milage is perfect with my new cam and 91 tune

View attachment 551581

Sir I know you already know this even after you fill her up but your on empty LOL