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by bloomingeek 35 days ago
Really cool story! It's always been my premise that good maintenance means longevity on vehicles. I keep our vehicles with the idea of "driving the wheels off of them", but always end up giving them to my kids after wanting an upgrade vehicle with some modern tech. (One of them has almost 200K miles on it.)

As for a Honda Element, I've always wanted one, but my wife thinks they're ugly. ;)
2 comments
lotsofpulp 35 days ago
> It's always been my premise that good maintenance means longevity on vehicles.

There are myriad examples of manufacturing defects and cost optimizations that lead to early failures regardless of maintenance. I would not trust a well maintained Stellantis vehicle to make it to 200k miles regardless of how well it was maintained.

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linksnapzz 35 days ago
I'll bet that a Ram 2500 w/ the 392 engine could, if maintaine, (in a climate where there's no road salt...) reach 200K w/ only regular maintenance.

Not much else that they make.

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hedora 35 days ago
Unless they use a completely different transmission platform than the 1500 or Jeeps, I wouldn't bet on it.

The transmission has an integrated computer that controls shifting, cooling, etc. The lines between that and the speedometer are flaky, so every once in a while it'll decide to not cool itself, get stuck in 2nd/3rd, etc, etc.

I have an additional 15 years of cool down I consider another Stellantis product. By then, they won't be selling ICE, for one thing. For another, the current engineers will be long gone.

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linksnapzz 34 days ago
It used to be that the six-speed Aisin HD transmission was an option, which wasn't a Stellantis product. Also, I'd immediately disable the AFM stuff, which has always been a threat to top-end lubrication.

My grandpa used to say that every American ought to purchase a Chrysler product once every ten years (if only to get the urge to do so out of their system) and sell it immediately afterwards. He was a Dodge fan in the same way that some people are Cubs fans; i.e. inured to disappointment.

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ErroneousBosh 35 days ago
> It's always been my premise that good maintenance means longevity on vehicles.

There's a guy on my Range Rover forum[1] that has over 500,000 miles on his ex-police 4.0, and it's well on its way to 600,000 miles. It has had the engine rebuilt, new wheel bearings, and a new transfer case chain, and of course maintenance.

My daily is my low-mileage one with only 190,000 on the clock, and my other needs some work and has 270,000 on the clock.

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