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OP, I had all of those thoughts when I just purchased a Dodge Durango GT. My worst fear was the 3.6 Pentastar, but after researching it, I’m satisfied with the choice. Sooo many horror stories about the Pentastar, made me flinch a little, with a quick call to my SIL who has owned 2 Pentastar’s, he loves the engine and would buy it again. The positive about a platform running a long time, is the mistakes have been worked out. The Durango is still a good looking SUV, and even though it’s run has been quite a long time, it still looks good.

BTW, the dear wife did not want the Hemi, even after my input and other opinions, she wanted the V6.

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Beautiful Durango! Yes, I was on the fence jumping back into a v6 Durango myself, but I think with proper maintenance(and luck🙄) the v6 should last a long time. The hemi has its issues also. Enjoy the ride!
 
When the Pentastar warranty has expired, The filter housing, thermostat housing and water pump will be replaced with the aluminum housings.
I own the 5.7 Hemi in my 1500 and has had the exhaust manifolds replaced under warranty due to the dreaded crack issue. I believe a lot of the Hemi tick issue is probably user induced. Its really hard not to want to feel the raw power of the Hemi, and I think contributes to lifter failure. Way back in the 70’s when I was tearing down engines for rebuilding prep, when I was 17 years old, the owner of the shop pointed out the issues related to abuse. His rule was, when aggressive acceleration is needed, slowly back off the throttle to keep the lifters from floating causing premature wear. Just my two cents.
 
So I am a tick over 20k and already made an appointment to get the service done next week, but I looked at the oil meter and still have 30% oil life left. This puts my oil computer interval at 6,500 miles?

FYI I change the oil on all my cars every 5,000 +/- miles.

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Around 2012 (somewhere aroung that year) the auto makers started stretching out the oil intervals. For example the Cummins went from 5K mile to 12K mile intervals, our 2018 Highlander was 10K miles intervals. I strongly recommend that you ignore those intervals, and use the 5K mile interval. Gee in 1992, my 92 Dakota 318 was 3K mile or light duty 5K mile intervals, and back then I did the 5K mile intervals. Its now been proven that 10K mile plus intervals cause heavy carbon building up on the piston rings, causing the rings to stick and allow oil to get past the rings. That is why the 100K mile engine with 10K intervals starts to lose oil, and using a quart of oil every month. My opinion it was EPA pressure to stretch out the intervals.
 
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I partly agree with your rings claim. I think the oil consumption is caused more from the low tension rings and super thin oil viscosity that these cars are running. Trying to squeeze every last little MPG they can get out of them. Again, EPA. When you combine all of the above it gets ugly. Damn the torpedos, full speed ahead!
 
Yeah my old Barber had bought a brand new 2001 Mini Cooper S and it was listed in the manual as 10,000 oil change interval.

I know that synthetic oils have a longer life cycle vs conventional oil but that is a little too excessive for me… every year regardless of mileage which usually is around 5,000 onmost my cars.
 
There are many negative issues with extended oil changes, @ 12K mile intervals with the 6.7 Cummins, its oil dilution with fuel diluting the oil through the stupid emissions. Those EPA devices actually causes you to burn more diesel per mile, and in my opinion, creates more pollution from burning more diesel.
 
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