3.6 Penstar Poll!

[PuddleJumper]

I have not had any issues with heat management, but that doesn't mean someone might. I am in the desert often but never had an issue with heat. I do also have a manual trans so that removes the need for the auto trans cooler which is a positve for me.

My torture test was in 2022 when I towed 6k lbs + 500 lbs in the bed to burning man and back (over 1100 miles round trip). From Long Beach CA all the way up throgh the eastern sierras topping out at about 8400 ft. during the hill climb I kept it in 4th and at about 70 mph, I forget the RPM's, but it was high. Oil temp reached a peak of 256 deg. and coolant held at 254 during the last 2-3 miles of the hill climb. As soon as we peaked and I shifted into 5th all temps fell below 220 in less than 2 minutes. I do NOT recommend doing this tesat as it is unnecessary to push it like that.

I've allocated most of my spend on suspension to go fast in the desert so the Supercharger was the best bang for the buck. I would love a V8, but this works great for now. I do agree the 392 would be the ideal swap since it is built for the abuse. The 392 has about 90 ft. lbs more to the wheels than the 3.6 supercharged version, and about another 75hp to the wheels which has got to feel awesome!

the 3.6 is the only supercharge application that AMW said works well. i should have specified its the demon and hellcat swaps that heat soak badly. With my primary goal of robustness and wanting to have a motor i could push hard for 10 years. They said it wasn't gonna be it to rebuild the 3.6 with better internals and SC it. at least not with the amount of money they would be charging me to do it. I originally wanted a SC 3.6 for the sake of lightness and trying to stay true to how i wheel my Mojave. It just didn't have the confirmed longevity i needed. I don't wanna be stuck in Columbia with a rod gone and a hole in the block. They said the 392 was the most reliable power i could get. which shocked me because i thought it'd be the 5.7. I didn't realize at the time that a 392 and 6.4 are not the same motor. I also figured i could put enough into the suspension to get the high speed offroad performance i want. after all TRXs and Raptors weigh hella more and manage quite well.

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[piroman683]

the 3.6 is the only supercharge application that AMW said works well. i should have specified its the demon and hellcat swaps that heat soak badly. With my primary goal of robustness and wanting to have a motor i could push hard for 10 years. They said it wasn't gonna be it to rebuild the 3.6 with better internals and SC it. at least not with the amount of money they would be charging me to do it. I originally wanted a SC 3.6 for the sake of lightness and trying to stay true to how i wheel my Mojave. It just didn't have the confirmed longevity i needed. I don't wanna be stuck in Columbia with a rod gone and a hole in the block. They said the 392 was the most reliable power i could get. which shocked me because i thought it'd be the 5.7. I didn't realize at the time that a 392 and 6.4 are not the same motor. I also figured i could put enough into the suspension to get the high speed offroad performance i want. after all TRXs and Raptors weigh hella more and manage quite well.

ah, the Demon and Hellcat makes sense. I do all my own work so theres not much of a cost for me to throw in new internals, but having a professional shop do that for the 3.6 + the SC then I definitely agree becuase that alone is going to run 10k for just the 3.6 build + upgraded parts for 3k + SC (8k) + SC labor (1k?) so I agree the 6.4 makes the most sense.

 

[Jeeper44mag]

I voted it's an OK motor. It gets the job done. But coming from a ram rebel that weighed 800lbs more, got better fuel economy even lifted on 35s, was much quicker, and sounded immensely better, the JT would be much improved paired with the 5.7L hemi. The 6.4L is overkill much like the price tag they imcluded with it in the JLs. Just a base 5.7L is better in every way at powering a truck this size.

THIS. THIS RIGHT HERE. Freaking retarded government regulations are the reason. I (and I bet many other thousands of Gladiator buyers) would have HAPPILY paid an additional $4-5k for the base 5.7L V8. And I seriously doubt we'd see any loss of overall mpg. Especially once you go to 37"+ tires or start towing 3000+ lbs.

Luis

 

[salvino]

Kinda intrested to see how this community feels about the primary power plant of the sickest truck ever made.

I’ve owned three and still have two of them. I have driven them a couple hundred thousand miles. I had one bad spark plug and no other issues. On my Gladiator I added the Baxter oil filter conversion. It cold starts much quieter with the change. With the proper gears and the 8 speed it’s a great engine tranny combo. Would it be fun to have more HP and torque? Sure but the 3.6 is a reliable engine with enough power for a vehicle that was never intended to be a sports car.

 

[Gl4dy8r]

What was the 25K in repairs for?

Let's see...3 axle shafts, at least 6 locker actuators, new pulleys, new belts, new radiator overflow tank and hoses, new drag link ends, wheel speed sensors(That somehow continue to go bad), new windshield washer fluid tank, That's just what I can remember off the top of my head. Oh also they replaced the center console lid because the lock broke in there. Plus all of the rentals that have been provided for me.

 

[willys 41]

3.6

https://www.google.com/search?clien...ate=ive&vld=cid:84bd5c6f,vid:CDjvfd9mo5s,st:0

 

[johnchabin]

THIS. THIS RIGHT HERE. Freaking retarded government regulations are the reason. I (and I bet many other thousands of Gladiator buyers) would have HAPPILY paid an additional $4-5k for the base 5.7L V8. And I seriously doubt we'd see any loss of overall mpg. Especially once you go to 37"+ tires or start towing 3000+ lbs.

Luis

The 392s I found were right at 100k. With this in mind, what do you suppose would be the price of a 5.7L V8 Jeep? I'm thinking a lot more than an additional 4-5K...

 

[PuddleJumper]

The 392s I found were right at 100k. With this in mind, what do you suppose would be the price of a 5.7L V8 Jeep? I'm thinking a lot more than an additional 4-5K...

a 392 is vastly different than a 5.7. a 392 isn't any ol 6.4. Its a built bottom end and valvetrain. your paying for an SRT crate motor when they say 392. a 5.7 on the other hand is not so therefore would be drastically cheaper as its just a fleet motor like the 3.6.

 

[Brahmajoe]

If I wasn't fine with it, I would have bought something else, or bought the diesel. The Pentastar should last quite a while, with proper maintenance.

I have a 22 and with 30k miles it’s been at the dealership for 2 weeks for a camshaft /lifter rocker failure. I’m convinced a good portion of the 3.6 engines have or are going to have this failure and the newer years happening a lot sooner, unsure if it’s shitty factory parts there using or what but it should be a recall, with it being a 6 hour job I’m sure it would be a loss for the company.

 

[Banned]

Let's see...3 axle shafts, at least 6 locker actuators, new pulleys, new belts, new radiator overflow tank and hoses, new drag link ends, wheel speed sensors(That somehow continue to go bad), new windshield washer fluid tank, That's just what I can remember off the top of my head. Oh also they replaced the center console lid because the lock broke in there. Plus all of the rentals that have been provided for me.

Damn, that's a lot of trouble.

 

[GeneralMaximus]

I doubt more than a handful of our Pentastars will reach 250k miles. But as a Gladiator engine, it does the job and at this point its as perfected as it will get.

 

[Banned]

a 392 is vastly different than a 5.7. a 392 isn't any ol 6.4. Its a built bottom end and valvetrain. your paying for an SRT crate motor when they say 392. a 5.7 on the other hand is not so therefore would be drastically cheaper as its just a fleet motor like the 3.6.

392 is a 6.4L, the block is the same. the 6.2L is a different engine, and as far as I know, doesn't suffer from the 5.7/6.4 aka 392 valve train failures.

 

[OldSarge]

the Magnuson kit does about 7 psi of boost, which has been pretty good. There are concerns that the rods and wrist pints are the weak links for boosted applications so theres a few aftermarket forged kits available. When its time for a rebuild I'll be adding those just to add more margin.

I like it - thanks again for sharing. The big advantage I can see from this approach is weight. How is it when slow off roading / rock crawling? Is the power delivery smooth or peaky?

 

[Jeeper44mag]

The 392s I found were right at 100k. With this in mind, what do you suppose would be the price of a 5.7L V8 Jeep? I'm thinking a lot more than an additional 4-5K...

What's the upcharge between a 3.6L Dodge Ram and a 5.7L Dodge Ram? Should be a similar difference. Glancing at their vehicle builder, I'm seeing a $3,000 upcharge between the 3.6L and the 5.7L.

You can't really compare the 392 (a much more expensive engine, in a very limited run that they're charging a premium for) to just a basic "mid tier" power upgrade.

Luis

 

[Banned]

At the end of the day, when the dust clears, this all boils down to one, or a handful of weasels who make all the decisions, giving orders to hundreds of thousands of workers. Weasels who are only concerned with their bottom lines and bonuses. If they have no integrity, their products will reflect that. They know about the failures, their PR people read these forums, and report. They know how they treat loyal customers is wrong, but they don't care. They are completely shameless. I guarantee you, if the CEO of Stellantis had to take a million dollar hit each year (which is a rounding error for them)to move his failure rate from 150,000 per million to 50,000 per million engines, he'd say "Fuck that."

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