Potentially shopping for a 4th Gen - tips or advice?

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Zorin

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Hi, everyone!

I'm Tim, and I am currently shopping for a new truck. My current truck is a 2009 Ford F150 with the 5.4L ( I rebuilt it, so no, that's not why I am truck shopping, LOL).

Fact is, I might have accidentally sold my truck, and the proceeds will put a very nice down payment on a newer, nicer truck.

I'm looking for a 2017 or newer 1500 Crew Cab, preferably a Big Horn or a Lone Star, with a 5.7L Hemi. I have picked this specifically, because as I understand it, the cam-flattening problem was largely taken care of by 2016. I also know that in 2018, the vendor for the 8.4 Uconnect system was switched, and the later Panasonic units can have reliability concerns.

Is there anything else on the trucks I should know or watch out for? Are you guys seeing these trucks go for quite a lot of miles before major trouble? Any other electronic tidbits known to fail, or otherwise flake out?

The truck I had before the '09 F150 was an '02 Ram 1500 Quad Cab with the 4.7L, and that thing NEVER let me down. In fact, I sold it to a neighbor's dad, and he's still driving it, it's up to around 265,000 miles now! Based on that truck, I decided I would look at the Rams, and I drove a 2017 Sport today. Slightly Hemi-ticky on start up, but otherwise, a damn fine driving truck.

Thanks in advance for your thoughts, and let's see some of those common concerns!

Tim
 

indept

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1st off how did you "accidentally" sell your truck?
As for what to look for, broken exhaust manifold bolts are common. all the brands including Ford, Chevy have had manifold bolt issues. So check that and have the seller fix it before buying. Also some hemi's have had camshaft / lifter failure. .ost have been attributed to excessive idling. From what I've read about 5% of hemis have this issue. Overall Rams are very reliable. The 2018's have issues with the 8.4" unconnected radios, the screen delaminates. I have a 2017 since new, zero issues.
 
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Zorin

Zorin

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1st off how did you "accidentally" sell your truck?
As for what to look for, broken exhaust manifold bolts are common. all the brands including Ford, Chevy have had manifold bolt issues. So check that and have the seller fix it before buying. Also some hemi's have had camshaft / lifter failure. .ost have been attributed to excessive idling. From what I've read about 5% of hemis have this issue. Overall Rams are very reliable. The 2018's have issues with the 8.4" unconnected radios, the screen delaminates. I have a 2017 since new, zero issues.
OK, I guess an explanation is in order, LOL.

I was at the lake with friends, and I'm pretty well known around here as a pretty good mechanic. A friend of a friend asked me what I would sell my truck for.

I figured it was a sort of rhetorical question, but I knew about where I was in the truck dollar wise, so I gave him a figure slightly over that.

Much to my surprise, he simply said, OK, I'll go get a loan on it.

I'm the kind of guy, if the price is right, I'll turn loose of it, and trust and believe, the price was right. So, it's a great chance to upgrade trucks!

Hell, I haven't had a car payment in a while, so why not?

As to your truck, I kind of figured the '17's would be about the cream of the crop, reliability wise. Great tip on the exhaust studs, I figured they had handled that my about this year range, as I simply do not get many Rams in period, much less for exhaust issues. Most I see here are '12-'14's for an evaporator core.

Tim
 

Wirerat

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I have a 2017 big horn qc 4x4 5.7. I had one of the exhuast manifolds warped with a broken bolt at 38k miles.

With you being a mechanic that probably has all the tools, it's not that big of a deal.

You can resurface the manifolds and they never warp again or swap to shortys/long tubes.

I have had the truck for two years and that was the only issue for me.
 
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Burla

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Tell your friend you was just joshing, and you will buy him a freak'n pizza to make up for it. Keep the Ford. You look at these modern rams and all their gimmicks, mds, purposely running the transmission hot for fuel mileage, a two part video just to check the transmission fluid level, and so on and so on. Add that to hemi tick and the possibility of losing a cam, don't do it. If he is a friend, he will understand, if he is not a friend, who cares?

I'm not saying rams arent comparable with the current field because they are, one thing is you can generally buy them for 10k less then a Ford, why do you think that is? When you account for value, their is a great argument for a ram, but buying someone elses mess with what we know now, keep the ford.
 
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Zorin

Zorin

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If you do get a ram with the hemi, use good high Moly oil, PUP, quaker state full synthetic, Redline, etc.
There's a short (45k+ posts:oops:) oil thread in the engine section full of info.
https://www.ramforum.com/threads/synthetic-oil.27664/
Quick question - I've seen this around the site - I have been snooping for a few days......what's PUP?
Tell your friend you was just joshing, and you will buy him a freak'n pizza to make up for it. Keep the Ford. You look at these modern rams and all their gimmicks, mds, purposely running the transmission hot for fuel mileage, a two part video just to check the transmission fluid level, and so on and so on. Add that to hemi tick and the possibility of losing a cam, don't do it. If he is a friend, he will understand, if he is not a friend, who cares?

I'm not saying rams arent comparable with the current field because they are, one thing is you can generally buy them for 10k less then a Ford, why do you think that is? When you account for value, their is a great argument for a ram, but buying someone elses mess with what we know now, keep the ford.
Wow! Quite a dissenting viewpoint!

As far as losing a cam goes, and the Hemi Tick, I have a very good friend who's a Chrysler powertrain engineer. He tells me that the valve train geometry lends itself to the tick, it's a small design boo boo, but it's not detrimental. What's he drive? Ram 1500.

On the cam thing, same engineer tells me that the lifters that were causing the cam problems were a supplier quality concern, and that was rectified for all Hemis after 2016.

Now, that said, I was NOT aware of the trans temp being run hot for better fuel mileage. How hot do they run them? This is of great importance for me, because I will be the first one to agree...if you want to cook a transmission.....run it hot.

What other concerns have you had that would lead to your opinion? This is actually quite beneficial for me, as it does help me make a better decision. As a professional technician, I can tell you that everything has some detrimental flaw.

GM - On the 5.3, first it was cracking heads, then it was oil pickup tube o rings, then it was MDS lifters....

On the Fords, first it was the 5.4L 2V blowing plugs, then the 5.4L 3V blowing timing chain tensioners and phasers, then it was the 5.0L having cylinder roundness problems early on, then IMRC problems later on, then the newest version - back to phaser concerns.

On the Hemis, we started with dropping valve seats, then we went to wiping cams.

If you at least KNOW the devil you're getting in bed with, you can decide if that's the devil you want to deal with, right?

Tim
 

Burla

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Quick question - I've seen this around the site - I have been snooping for a few days......what's PUP?

Wow! Quite a dissenting viewpoint!

As far as losing a cam goes, and the Hemi Tick, I have a very good friend who's a Chrysler powertrain engineer. He tells me that the valve train geometry lends itself to the tick, it's a small design boo boo, but it's not detrimental. What's he drive? Ram 1500.

On the cam thing, same engineer tells me that the lifters that were causing the cam problems were a supplier quality concern, and that was rectified for all Hemis after 2016.

Now, that said, I was NOT aware of the trans temp being run hot for better fuel mileage. How hot do they run them? This is of great importance for me, because I will be the first one to agree...if you want to cook a transmission.....run it hot.

What other concerns have you had that would lead to your opinion? This is actually quite beneficial for me, as it does help me make a better decision. As a professional technician, I can tell you that everything has some detrimental flaw.

GM - On the 5.3, first it was cracking heads, then it was oil pickup tube o rings, then it was MDS lifters....

On the Fords, first it was the 5.4L 2V blowing plugs, then the 5.4L 3V blowing timing chain tensioners and phasers, then it was the 5.0L having cylinder roundness problems early on, then IMRC problems later on, then the newest version - back to phaser concerns.

On the Hemis, we started with dropping valve seats, then we went to wiping cams.

If you at least KNOW the devil you're getting in bed with, you can decide if that's the devil you want to deal with, right?

Tim
put the costs on the board to compare, you want to sell a truck your truck, in order to by another used truck. And yes to what you said about the devil. But, you don't want to sell your truck, someone else wanted to buy it and you use that as justification to sell it. It sounds like you have the starch and talent to fix anything that breaks anyhow, so less of a tragedy if things don't work out, but every year trucks get more and more gimmicky.
 
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Zorin

Zorin

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put the costs on the board to compare, you want to sell a truck your truck, in order to by another used truck. And yes to what you said about the devil. But, you don't want to sell your truck, someone else wanted to buy it and you use that as justification to sell it. It sounds like you have the starch and talent to fix anything that breaks anyhow, so less of a tragedy if things don't work out, but every year trucks get more and more gimmicky.
Well, yeah.....pretty much correct, hahahaha.

But hey, who doesn't enjoy a newer and fresher set of wheels here and there?

I think what I am trying to avoid is getting into a situation where I am both paying to drive, and paying to fix. While I may or may not have the talent to fix problems, fact is, I nearly ALWAYS buy cars that come "some assembly required".

With what I will get out of the F150, I can actually afford to go buy a nice low mile truck (somewhere in the 30-50K mile neighborhood), and just enjoy doing routine maintenance for a hopefully, good long while.

And I do VERY much agree with the "gimmicky" thing. That's why I have specifically zeroed in on Lone Star and Big Horn trucks, with the V8 engine, and preferably, 2WD. I'd love a Laramie Longhorn or a Limited, but there is a ton of things to go wrong on those. The Big Horns seem to be a nice mix of decent equipment that isn't too gimmicky, and the V8 is nice and understressed, so it shouldn't work as hard as a V6 truck, which will hopefully extend the life of it. With a 2WD, there's less mechanical stuff, better gas mileage, lower weight, so forth and so on. I'm really trying to zero in on finding a nice truck, that kind of beats the odds, if you will.

As I mentioned earlier, I found where the newer 8.4's were delaminating, but I was trying to figure out if anyone had seen issues with the 8HP70, if anyone with a truck newer than 2016 had a cam failure, how the basic operation of the truck was holding up, and if these things rusted out like the older pickups. Maybe some unforeseen electrical gremlins, maybe some suspension problems, et cetera.

Thanks again for your thoughts!

Tim
 

Burla

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In 2016 they changed the rollers and beefed them up, we still get hemi tick and cam fails here, maybe less often, but then again as these trucks get in that spot 70-130k miles is when we see most of the cam fails.
 

CamperMike

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The screen delamination was 2018 only but so far mine(2018) is good. The exhaust manifold bolts also still fail on the newer ones... mine did at around 57k miles. As for Borlas comment on transmission temps I actually see fairly low transmission temps on mine even when towing. Engine oil gets hot though.
 
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