If the 5.7 Hemi goes away in 2024, I'm out of the RAM

[Darksteel165]

They already announced they are going to have the Hurricane in the 2024 models.

If I wanted a hurricane engine I would of bought a Ford.
510 horsepower on a 6 cylinder sounds like a horrible idea under load like a pickup truck likely is.
Arent they doing several versions of the hurricane?

 

[HSKR R/T]

If I wanted a hurricane engine I would of bought a Ford.
510 horsepower on a 6 cylinder sounds like a horrible idea under load like a pickup truck likely is.
Arent they doing several versions of the hurricane?

You do realize all Semis use 6 cylinder engines and are towing way more weight than anything you will ever put behind your truck. And inline 6-cyl gas engines powered many heavy duty dump trucks up until the 70s. And those has engines weerent even turbo's. It's more about gearing and torque when towing and inline engines make more torque than V style engines.

 

[Darksteel165]

And those has engines weerent even turbo's.

Exactly...

 

[HSKR R/T]

Exactly...

The turbos actually help the engine

 

[Biga]

If I wanted a hurricane engine I would of bought a Ford.
510 horsepower on a 6 cylinder sounds like a horrible idea under load like a pickup truck likely is.
Arent they doing several versions of the hurricane?

Ford doesn't offer an Inline 6 only a V6

 

[SD Rebel]

The question isn't if the Hurricane is coming, the question is if the Hemi 5.7L is staying.

If they keep the Hemi (even with E-Torque only), we should all be happy that we have options. The RAM is needing more engine powertrain options anyways, especially compared to GM and Ford.

Could look similar to Ford's lineup, where you have a base NA V6, then a smaller hp rated turbo 6, then a V8, and finally your top engine is a higher output turbo 6. At least for RAM, it's a cooler Inline with more power than the 3.5L Ecoboost.

 

[jimothy]

My speculation—which is worth every penny you paid for it—is that the Ram will first get the Hurricane High Output only, as an upgrade over the Hemi. The Hemi will stick around for one more model year, then the standard output Hurricane will become the base engine, and the Pentastar and Hemi will meet each other in that big garage in the sky.

Why offer only the HO engine the first year? To establish it as the “premium” engine choice, an upgrade from the Hemi. This would be an attempt to give it some cred amongst those that, understandably, are not happy about the disappearance of V8 engines. That is, they want to establish the Hurricane as better before they make it the only choice. “Don’t fear a turbo six; look at the boost in horsepower and torque!”

I’m not suggesting that strategy will work, or at least I’m not suggesting it’ll work with everyone. I’m merely suggesting that it would make sense from a marketing perspective to try.

 

[Dewey]

My speculation—which is worth every penny you paid for it—is that the Ram will first get the Hurricane High Output only, as an upgrade over the Hemi. The Hemi will stick around for one more model year, then the standard output Hurricane will become the base engine, and the Pentastar and Hemi will meet each other in that big garage in the sky.

Why offer only the HO engine the first year? To establish it as the “premium” engine choice, an upgrade from the Hemi. This would be an attempt to give it some cred amongst those that, understandably, are not happy about the disappearance of V8 engines. That is, they want to establish the Hurricane as better before they make it the only choice. “Don’t fear a turbo six; look at the boost in horsepower and torque!”

I’m not suggesting that strategy will work, or at least I’m not suggesting it’ll work with everyone. I’m merely suggesting that it would make sense from a marketing perspective to try.

Sounds perfectly reasonable. I’m sure that’s the plan.

 

[HSKR R/T]

My speculation—which is worth every penny you paid for it—is that the Ram will first get the Hurricane High Output only, as an upgrade over the Hemi. The Hemi will stick around for one more model year, then the standard output Hurricane will become the base engine, and the Pentastar and Hemi will meet each other in that big garage in the sky.

Why offer only the HO engine the first year? To establish it as the “premium” engine choice, an upgrade from the Hemi. This would be an attempt to give it some cred amongst those that, understandably, are not happy about the disappearance of V8 engines. That is, they want to establish the Hurricane as better before they make it the only choice. “Don’t fear a turbo six; look at the boost in horsepower and torque!”

I’m not suggesting that strategy will work, or at least I’m not suggesting it’ll work with everyone. I’m merely suggesting that it would make sense from a marketing perspective to try.

Then there are those of us who like performance enough to know the Hurricane is an upgrade. Sure you lose that V8 exhaust sound. But the sound doesn't make it fast.

 

[WXman]

And then there are those of us who are buying trucks, not sports cars, and performance is a low priority. We want dependable power, i.e. V8 Hemi with no direct injection, no turbos, no fancy EGR systems, and an oil dipstick.

 

[Darksteel165]

Yep. My 5.7 drives like a sports car. If I wanted a truck that wasn't going to last forever I would of gotten a ecoboost.
Hell I wanted the 6.4 but Ram doesn't put them in the 1500s for some reason.
I likely would of got an Expedition instead of a 1500 but they only come as twin turbo v6 like what it looks like ram will be doing soon.

 

[silver billet]

inline 6 engines don't make more torque just because they're inline, that's a bit of a myth. Some inline 6 engines do produce torque easily, example the cummins 5.9 and 6.7 but that's due to the undersquare design and not because its inline. An undersquare engine has a longer stroke than bore. The biggest benefit I've always read about an inline 6 is how smooth they are. They are naturally balanced and don't need all kinds of weights hanging off the crank to balance the rotation forces.

The powerstroke v8 produces gobs more torque than the cummins i6, both are undersquare. The duramax v8 produces far less torque, its oversquare.

But I'm with @WXman , I do want more power but I want power reliably and simply, just a good old fashioned v8 with no start stop, no etorque, no MDS, no silly gimmicks.

The only engine that excites me these days are the two offerings from Ford (sadly), the 6.8 and the 7.3 used in the new super dutys. They did have a camshaft/lifter failure issue though from what I can see that appears to be limited to a bad batch and has been corrected since.

 

[jimothy]

Well, so much for my speculation about today's announcements, which are just appearance packages for the Rebel and TRX. The good news, I offer a double your money back guarantee, which works out to $0 for each of you.

I really expected the "new force" to be the Hurricane, which would have made sense: hurricane force wind, forced induction, plus simply "force" in the physics sense as in what propels the truck.

I still expect the Hemi to remain for 2024, Hurricane to be an option, and Hemi to disappear by 2025 at the latest. My double your money back guarantee applies to these predictions, as well.

 

[silver billet]

Well, so much for my speculation about today's announcements, which are just appearance packages for the Rebel and TRX. The good news, I offer a double your money back guarantee, which works out to $0 for each of you.

I really expected the "new force" to be the Hurricane, which would have made sense: hurricane force wind, forced induction, plus simply "force" in the physics sense as in what propels the truck.

I still expect the Hemi to remain for 2024, Hurricane to be an option, and Hemi to disappear by 2025 at the latest. My double your money back guarantee applies to these predictions, as well.

I do expect the hurricane to be an option. But as for when the hemi disappears, that I'm not so sure about. Stellantis as a group apparently doesn't have the same crisis anymore that FCA did, they have enough smaller puddle jumpers to boost their corporate averages, so the hemi could very well stick around in trucks for some time as a paid upgrade (similar to the 5.0 with the F150 lineup).

GM is investing heavily into v8's for their trucks, they made an anoucement to this effect just this year so Ram might not want to give up the hemi that quickly and be the only truck without a v8.

 

[WXman]

In the long run none of this will matter because Stellantis is running the company directly into the ground. They are letting sales shrink for the first time in YEARS. A Challenger with no V8? Good luck trying to sell those. They have no small cars to keep CAFE scores up. I read that their high water mark with Jeep Wrangler was 5 years ago now. That’s the halo of the brand. A brand they’re letting sink. Now the 5th Gen Ram sales are shrinking because it’s been 5 years with few to no meaningful updates. GM and Ford both have new trucks, new engines, new packages never seen before. What’s Ram done in the last 5 years? The HD trucks are using 14 year old cabs and sheetmetal with 11 year old engines while the competition is showing off new HD trucks with new engines. Stellantis is just sitting on their hands and nothing is happening. They’re sinking. This is not a path forward. In 5 years we might not have a future for Ram trucks or the brand may be sold off. I mean, seriously, what are they planning to sell next year when every other brand has something better?

 

[John Galt]

In the long run none of this will matter because Stellantis is running the company directly into the ground. They are letting sales shrink for the first time in YEARS. A Challenger with no V8? Good luck trying to sell those. They have no small cars to keep CAFE scores up. I read that their high water mark with Jeep Wrangler was 5 years ago now. That’s the halo of the brand. A brand they’re letting sink. Now the 5th Gen Ram sales are shrinking because it’s been 5 years with few to no meaningful updates. GM and Ford both have new trucks, new engines, new packages never seen before. What’s Ram done in the last 5 years? The HD trucks are using 14 year old cabs and sheetmetal with 11 year old engines while the competition is showing off new HD trucks with new engines. Stellantis is just sitting on their hands and nothing is happening. They’re sinking. This is not a path forward. In 5 years we might not have a future for Ram trucks or the brand may be sold off. I mean, seriously, what are they planning to sell next year when every other brand has something better?

Newer isnt better. lots of YouTube videos of diesel mechanics talking about how terrible those new diesel motors are.

sure I’d like to see a real gen5 HD ram but I don’t want more plastic parts and a more eco-friendly motor that’ll fall apart.

 

[jimothy]

I do expect the hurricane to be an option. But as for when the hemi disappears, that I'm not so sure about. Stellantis as a group apparently doesn't have the same crisis anymore that FCA did, they have enough smaller puddle jumpers to boost their corporate averages, so the hemi could very well stick around in trucks for some time as a paid upgrade (similar to the 5.0 with the F150 lineup).

GM is investing heavily into v8's for their trucks, they made an anoucement to this effect just this year so Ram might not want to give up the hemi that quickly and be the only truck without a v8.

You make a case for continued V8 development, and if it's not clear by now, I'm mostly talking out of my you-know-what on this topic, so I wouldn't be terribly surprised if I end up being wrong.

First, a clarification to my (mostly worthless) prediction above: I expect 2024 to be the last MY for the Hemi, but wouldn't be surprised to see it stick around for the 2025 MY. If it's still around for 2026, I'll offer my triple-your-money-back guarantee.

We know these things:

1. All automakers (well, all with ICEs) are under EU and CAFE pressure.
2. The current gen Hemi is 20 years decades old, with incremental, but not radical, improvements during this time.
3. Stellantis has poured significant resources into the Hurricane (and, groan, EVs), so they'll want to market this and get it into as many vehicles as possible.
4. Two thirds of F-150 sales are EcoBoosts (2.7 or 3.5), and only 25% are V8s.
5. Toyota no longer sells a V8.
6. GM announced continued development of V8s, and Ford debuts a new Coyote engine for the 2024 Mustang.
7. Nobody knows or cares what Nissan is up to (joking, but just a little bit).

The first five points paint a picture where the demise of the V8 is inevitable, while the sixth point argues against it. But, silence from Stellantis about continued Hemi (or V8 in general) development, and knowing that they put a lot of resources into the Hurricane implies that they haven't been putting much into V8s.

Personally, I'm indifferent. I plan on keeping my 2021 Ram for a long time. By that time, the Hurricane will have either proven itself or had enough time to fix the quirks (beyond inevitable problems with D.I.), or we'll all forced to drive tiny vehicles driven by a hamster on a wheel. So I'm curious how this plays out, but I don't have a horse in the race myself.

 

[Dewey]

In the long run none of this will matter because Stellantis is running the company directly into the ground. They are letting sales shrink for the first time in YEARS. A Challenger with no V8? Good luck trying to sell those. They have no small cars to keep CAFE scores up. I read that their high water mark with Jeep Wrangler was 5 years ago now. That’s the halo of the brand. A brand they’re letting sink. Now the 5th Gen Ram sales are shrinking because it’s been 5 years with few to no meaningful updates. GM and Ford both have new trucks, new engines, new packages never seen before. What’s Ram done in the last 5 years? The HD trucks are using 14 year old cabs and sheetmetal with 11 year old engines while the competition is showing off new HD trucks with new engines. Stellantis is just sitting on their hands and nothing is happening. They’re sinking. This is not a path forward. In 5 years we might not have a future for Ram trucks or the brand may be sold off. I mean, seriously, what are they planning to sell next year when every other brand has something better?

Dodge’s entire image is the Hemi Challenger and Charger no doubt about that. Eliminating that excitement is going to completely change the face of the company. Not sure how they think they can survive that. The used market on those vehicles is gonna get extremely busy and new vehicle sales will plummet. True performance oriented buyers who love good ole’ US V8 muscle will run away from the six popper in droves and never come back. At this point I honestly think these car companies don’t really care anymore due to government regulations. It’s a losing battle for them and in the end we all lose.

 

[silver billet]

Dodge’s entire image is the Hemi Challenger and Charger no doubt about that. Eliminating that excitement is going to completely change the face of the company. Not sure how they think they can survive that. The used market on those vehicles is gonna get extremely busy and new vehicle sales will plummet. True performance oriented buyers who love good ole’ US V8 muscle will run away from the six popper in droves and never come back. At this point I honestly think these car companies don’t really care anymore due to government regulations. It’s a losing battle for them and in the end we all lose.

One thing to remember is that dodge is changing, but that doesn't mean lost sales, it could just mean different sales/buyers. There are lots of buyers who would be very interested in EV sports cars/family cars.

 

[CalvinC]

Good point, could be a transformation for Dodge, where they swivel from one type of customer to another, but don't loose net any.

VW did something similar. Many diehard VW fans, myself included, find little to get excited about in the modern lineup. They went from being the quirky enthusiast choice in the 80s, 90s and early Oughts to mass-market copy & paste niche filling manufacturer for the everyman.

Their sales have never been higher, and I could care less about them.