In my opinion, I believe ford is a much better built truck than dodge, better looking, and more comfortable. I'm not talking about the engine right now, just the brand. Me and more close family members have all owned all of the big 3 brands, both gas and diesel. I love the cummins engine, I think it's an awesome engine in an expensive shipping crate . I also think their tranny lacks a lot to be desired, the old ones anyways. To be honest, I think people that drive dodges are somewhat jealous that fords are nicer looking and built better. I think they bash ford's so much because of the problems the 6.0 had in it's early stages, had it not been for that, not sure what they would have complained about in ford trucks.

Earlier this year before I came to Iraq, I went and test drove all 3 brand new diesels from each of the big 3. Loved them all, great trucks with great engines. I would have to say that the Ford was the most comfortable and best looking of the 3. Power was good, but the truck is the heaviest of the 3, which was apparent. The chevy had nothing special in the looks department, but the duramax mated with the allison was an impressive combo! Nice truck, but need more ground clearance. My favorite to drive was the dodge though. The cummins is very impressive, and the new 6 speed seemed better than the old 4 speed. That's about the only good in the truck, the rest of the interior was cramped, umcomfortable, and kinda hard on the eyes. I would almost buy the dodge if the price was lower. For not being that nice of a truck, it was priced pretty comparatively with the ford, so I wouldn't do it. All in all though, 3 solid engines.

Being here in Iraq, I watch vehicles come and go all day long. I'm stationed in Baghdad, and the only trucks I ever see leave the wire are Ford's, and they are all diesels. They range from uparmored F-250's up to completely armored F-550's. 50% of the SUV's that go out are excursions with diesels too. For me, that says something. I have only seen 1 dodge half ton truck here on base. Fair amount of chevy trucks too, they just never leave the base. So when peoples lives are on the line, you can see what they choose.

Sorry if I've gone off topic here or pissed anyone off with my opinions, just wanted to throw my 2 cents in!!

 

I currently run a lube/service shop near NIsku Alberta, one of the biggest industrial hubs in north america. One of the most recent trends with all of my fleet buisness is alot of them are switching from Dodge to the 6.4L Ford.

They have told me numerous times the Dodge just does not hold up as well. Now you need to take into account off road abuse,. as well as driver abuse, but both combined 75% of them hav gone to Ford. I myself have only seen one '08 SD that was not diesel and that was yesterday, shocked the hell out of me. lol.

Most of what I have heard is from Drivers coming in and service managers who bring in the fleet trucks. MOst all of the Dodge owners are changing their air filters every oil change and often just about every week. Bad design there, remedied so far on the 6.7l with a oddly thick air filter.6-7 inches. I find I change Dodge fuel filters almost 4-1 to the Fords as well

 

How can an air filter get clogged up so quick?!

I don't think my vacuum cleaner could clog a normal Honda Civic air filter...

 

Desert air maybe????

 

I've never driven through a desert... but I can only assume that it is dirty air going in to the filter...

but my second thought might be they are attaching a hose to their filter box and using it as a portable vacuum to clean out the insides of their trucks after eating Micky D's...

 

No desert, I would guess from his post that these are mostly fleet trucks and in this area they are likely oilfield and on busy dirt/mud oilfield or logging roads on a constant basis. I have traveled these roads often (not with my truck anymore thankfully) and they are very hard on trucks.


My dad bought a new cummins Dodge last spring, he really liked the 08 superduty, and sometimes talks like he regrets not getting one. His deciding factor was not price, but fuel economy. He found one of the last mostly loaded 5.9's in western Canada and really likes the truck, hasn't seen the dealer yet and regulary gets 18+mpg average which is more than a couple more than my 6L gets even with a tune.
All his research prior to buying however was that all the new engines mileage suffered, not just the Ford's.

 

Not to hijack a thread or anything, but look at one common issue that keeps coming up here is problems with the engine. Now, this engine is supplied to Ford as opposed to being built by Ford. (Granted, even the engines Ford builds themselves have a significant supplier part content.) Ford - and GM as well - are noted for being absolutely ruthless with their suppliers. This adversarial relationship leads to all sorts of problems. Would you want to try to make a living off of somebody who wanted every last dime from you? What kind of product or service would you give them?

What all of this dysfunctional behavior in the industry leads to can be summed up in one the trucks in our fleet - an early 2003 F-350 Powerstroke. Those of you who know these trucks know exactly what I'm going to say next. This engine in this thing has been a never ending nightmare. We paid over $7,000 extra to get a great truck - powered by a piece of junk. Nothing that goes wrong with this thing is cheap and it's been out of warranty for the last 30,000 miles. Now, if we could only install an F-150 cruise control switch so it would burn to the ground...

 

Well....Dodge doesn't build their diesel either...Too bad you got a piece of junk. Some folks who know these trucks are having no problems with their '03 Fords Powerstrokes. It's a 'ying-yang' world and I guess we just have to deal with it!

 

Sorry for the rant - with no conclusion. I kind of got a little busy with a small snow storm we had. What I was leading up to was why the owner of the company keep buying Super Duty trucks (with diesels) when he could buy anything he wants. Yes, our problem child (the '03) has really shaken our faith in Ford, but I'm 99.9% sure we'll keep buying them for one reason only - brand loyalty. We buy trucks to drive them into their graves. The trucks generally get about 25,000 miles per year for the first 3-4 years, then drop down to a more reasonable 10 - 15,000 per year. That means almost everything in the fleet has over 100,000 on the clock. Our oldest truck (a 1996) is about ready to go meet its maker.

Why was I ranting about how Ford treats its suppliers when neither GM or Dodge builds their own diesel either? Because how you treat your suppliers has a good deal to do with quality of the product they sell you. Ford and GM are absolutely brutal. Dodge is at least reasonable. In my humbble opinion, Ford got exactly what it deserved with the early '03's. Unfortunately, it's us poor owners that continue to pay the price for that strained relationship.