(cool guitar music)
(engine revving)
- Since world war II, and besides the Jeep,
the Dodge or Ram Power Wagon
is one of the most notorious
purpose built trucks in US history.
Once used as a functional tool in world war II,
to being used as a piece of farm machinery,
to being a factory built off-road legend,
and today we get to see if the new Power Wagons
still live up to its legendary history.
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so that way you guys can hold on to the ride with us.
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that we have a huge inventory
of new tires, wheels and suspension kits
for your Jeep, truck, Toyota, or SUV,
or Power Wagon,
with special financing including an available 0% plan.
You don't have to worry about waiting
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at trailbuiltoffroad.com,
otherwise we'll have the link above me here.
Hey, what's up guys, Josh from Trailbuilt
and the Power Wagon is quite often referred to
as one of the most off-road capable full-sized trucks
to come straight from the factory.
Mechanically derived from the Dodge's WC series
that were used in world war II,
the Power Wagon was introduced in 1946
as the first civilian production four wheel drive truck.
Some speculate that the Power Wagon name
was actually derived from a trucking magazine
from its era of origin,
although it was most commonly referred to as the flat fender
or a T137,
which is a Dodge engineering code
that many hardcore Power Wagon enthusiasts
still refer to it as to this day.
The Dodge Power Wagon was produced from 1945 to 1980
in various models series.
With the first Dodge Power Wagon model
lasting basically unchanged until 1957.
By then it picked up the newer
Dodge half ton pickup styling and interior.
Many of these early generations of the Power Wagon
are some of the most collectable off-road trucks ever made.
Then, as a name plate for the Dodge Ram,
the Power Wagon was made from 2005 until 2013
until the Power Wagon was marketed under the name of Ram,
as in Ram trucks, from 2013 until current.
In 2005 Dodge has resurrected the Power Wagon name
on a version of the Dodge Ram 2500,
which was basically a special off-road version
of the 2500 Ram that had a 5.7 liter Hemi V8
as its only power plant option,
until 2014 when it received the 6.4 liter Hemi.
Unfortunately Ram hasn't offered the diesel Cummins
in the Power Wagon
and even the new 2021 75th anniversary edition
still comes standard with the 6.4 liter Hemi
and is the only engine option.
But even without the diesel option,
these Power Wagons are still bad-ass trucks
when you get them in their natural off-road environment.
With electronic lockers, both front and rear,
4/10 gears, electronically controlled sway bar disconnects,
a Warn 12,000 pound winch with synthetic cable,
an eight speed adaptive shift control
heavy duty transmission,
and the 410 horsepower, 429 foot pounds of torque,
6.4 liter Hemi,
and a plethora of other unique Power Wagon features,
there's no wonder as to why MotorTrend picked
the Ram's heavy duty line of trucks
as their 2020 truck of the year winner.
But we can't just take everyone's word
on how well this thing works.
So if you didn't already see,
we have a 2020 Ram Power Wagon sitting behind me
and we're gonna go put this thing to the test.
So make sure and hold on and let's go.
Guys, well we have just left the shop.
We are driving this 2020 Ram Power Wagon with the 6.4 liter.
We're gonna go out to our Trailbuilt proving grounds
and we're gonna put this thing to the test.
We're gonna show you guys how well this thing can crawl
and do its thing while off-roading.
So we're gonna try out the front and rear lockers,
we're gonna disconnect the sway bars,
throw it in four low and let her go.
So make sure and stay tuned
because this is gonna be some fun.
Let's go.
(cool guitar music)
(engine revving)
You guys might recognize where we're at
as we've been out here before
with some of our other testing videos.
So we're gonna put this Power Wagon to the test.
We're gonna climb some of these hills,
especially with the snow it's gonna make it
pretty interesting, pretty challenging.
And I'm super excited because
something you guys don't know about me
is I love these Power Wagons.
Not so much the newer ones because they're
all fancy and whatever,
but I like the older version Power Wagons
where they still had the leaf springs in all four corners
and rode like lumber wagons.
So I'm pretty excited to try this thing out.
Haven't driven one of these new Power Wagons before
so pretty exciting to see
what kind of performance
and what kind of capability it has
when putting it to the test.
So let's go try this thing out.
(cool guitar music)
Traction control kept kicking in,
so as soon as we would gain enough momentum
where that inertia sensor would pick up on it
it would say, "Heck no, you guys aren't doing this.
You can't have fun out here in the snow
and in the cold weather.
No, you gotta behave yourselves.
You gotta be adults about all this."
And well that's just no fun
so we're gonna move on to our next test
and we're gonna go try out the hill climbs.
I don't know, maybe you guys have suggestions
on how we can turn off that stupid traction control,
roll stability control, whatever it is.
We even tried holding down the button for like 10 seconds,
but it would just turn back on.
So I don't know, maybe there's another trick to it.
Let us know, but let's move on to the next test.
It's cold.
All right, so we couldn't do our donuts
the way we wanted to do our donuts.
So the next test that we have on our list is the hill climb.
Now being out here in Wisconsin
we do have a few inches of snow on the ground.
And the hill that we're about to climb is probably,
I don't know, maybe a 30 degree angle, something like that.
It's steep enough that it's gonna give us
some traction issues.
So the first test that we're gonna do
is we're gonna go up the hill.
We're gonna throw it in four low
and we're gonna leave the lockers off.
We're not gonna lock the axles, anything like that
and we're just gonna see if we can crawl the hill.
Then we're gonna come back down,
we're gonna lock just the rear axle,
do it again,
see how much more traction we have.
And then the last test we're gonna do
we're gonna be in four low,
we're gonna have the front and rear lockers both engaged,
disconnect off, the sway bar disconnect off,
and then see how it does.
So, and the other thing too I should mention
is that we're not gonna be airing down the tires
or anything like that.
So we're gonna be at regular street pressure.
So definitely we'll put it to the test and see how it goes.
Let's go try it out.
All right, let's go guys.
We are in four low, open diffs,
so I do not have either the front or rear lockers engaged
and I don't have the sway bar disconnected.
And so we're just gonna go
up this hill in four low,
let her go, see how much traction we actually have.
So far it's doing pretty good.
We're already three quarters of the way or so up the hill,
but this is the part where it really starts getting steep.
So we're still crawling, I'm barely even on the gas at all.
Now for the most extreme part of this hill climb.
Coming up the very top ledge, didn't even barely slip a tire
and it walked right up it, no lockers engaged.
That was impressive.
I was not expecting that.
So we're gonna have to find a steeper hill
where we can really put this thing to the test,
lose traction,
and then kick in the lockers.
So not too bad.
I'm impressed.
It doesn't do donuts for shit,
but I'm still impressed with the rear axle.
I don't have the sway bar disconnected yet.
We're just gonna try climbing up this little ledge here.
It's basically like a berm that's been washed out.
So as you can see, didn't get too far.
Just got one of the front tires up on the ledge
and obviously lost traction right there.
So we're gonna just back down just a little bit here.
Now for the fun part,
and the part I've been waiting for,
is we're gonna go ahead and throw it in neutral
and then lock the front.
So front and rear lockers engaging as we speak.
It can take a little bit, which is really weird.
In fact, the front locker has not actually
fully engaged yet.
So I don't know if it's going to, I wouldn't be surprised.
Sway bar disconnect in progress.
So I got both the sway bar disconnecting right now,
it's blinking at me,
and then I also have the front locker
that has just been blinking at me the whole time.
So I don't know guys, we might not even be able
to do this test with the front locker engaged
because it just doesn't seem like it's working,
which is quite the disappointment
that it's not locked in all the way.
(car instruments beeping)
Wow, this is impressive.
We are already almost...
Oh, there we go,
now we're losing traction.
Here we go, come on, come on.
I can't tell if the driver's side front...
I can tell if the driver...
So the driver side front tire is spinning.
Now it says we're locked both front and rear.
(car instruments beeping)
I'm gonna scissor the steering wheel a little bit,
see if we can get some traction here.
There we got it, we got it.
Cone on, let's go.
Careful of the belly pan here.
That's the only one disadvantage with this
compared to like a Jeep,
is the longer wheel base.
It's not too hard to get bottomed out
on some of these more steeper obstacles.
Shorter wheel base,
obviously we would have more of what's called
the break over angle.
So with a longer wheel base,
you don't get quite as much ground clearance
underneath the belly pan
as you would with a shorter wheel base.
So we're just gonna go ahead.
We're gonna try this climb again.
and see if we can just pop the belly pan
right back up on this berm here.
(car instruments beeping)
Now, remember guys, we're still running street pressure.
So if I was aired down, I think our chances
of climbing this berm would be a lot better than what it is,
but nonetheless, still definitely really impressed
with how well this thing even climbed with street pressure,
stock tires,
it's got the Wrangler Goodyear Dirt tracks on it,
which is a really good traction tire
for all different types of terrains and good on the road
and still plenty of traction
to do things like this off-road.
So pretty impressed, I like it.
The long wheel base I think hurts us a little bit.
And the street pressures,
but still it's doing its thing.
I mean, it's climbing some things it's probably
not really designed to climb,
but that's all right
because that just shows you guys
how much of a machine this thing is.
Look at that.
That was impressive.
That was pretty amazing.
Don't wanna slide off the edge here.
All right, so we're gonna turn on the downhill assist,
the downhill control assist button.
And what it does is basically just slows the truck down
using the transmission, using the brakes, eases off the gas.
So if you're starting to go down
a somewhat of a slippery climb,
it's gonna limit your amount of momentum basically
going down that hill,
especially on loose traction situations
like whether it's gravel or maybe sand
or whatever it might be.
So it's a neat feature.
It's nothing fancy,
but it definitely does help slow you down
when you're going down some of those really steep declines.
So what is my conclusion on the new 2020 Ram Power Wagon?
Well, quite honestly, I have to be a little bit disappointed
with these new trucks.
There's too much technology for me.
You guys know I drive that old '73 Scout.
That thing has done wonders for me
without all that extra technology.
So without all of that, I think it would be pretty decent.
If we could really get it out here and, you know,
put this thing to the boards and spin it around,
I think it would be pretty fun,
but obviously it doesn't let us do that.
The hill climbs though,
especially with the front rear lockers engaged,
four low and the sway bar disconnected,
man this thing crawled right up that berm.
That was pretty impressive.
We're running street pressure
on these Goodyear Wrangler dirt tracks and long wheel base.
So it still did really well climbing up that berm.
I was impressed that way.
I'm not a new truck kind of a guy.
I mean, this would be great for a daily driver
and if I had to put it to work maybe on a farm
or whatever it may be,
maybe I'm cutting down trees and hauling lumber
or whatever the case may be,
I think it would be okay with that.
Maybe just hauling kids to the store,
to the school or whatever,
but all in all to really put
one of these newer trucks off-road
and put it to the test,
well, I don't really think Ram had that intention
in mind for this truck.
I think they wanted it to be capable off-road,
but if you really want to do some serious
hardcore off-roading, Jeep, Toyota Tacoma, 4Runner,
maybe that's the best route to go.
Other than that, I think it was decent.
It was okay.
It had decent amount of power with the 6.4 liter Hemi,
it was all right there.
Would be even better to see it with a Cummins diesel
since this thing's probably spending
most of its time on road anyways for most of us.
If I was looking to purchase one,
I wouldn't purchase it strictly
to do a bunch of off-roading with
and I don't think anybody else would either,
but it does do pretty decent crawling off-road.
Other than that, if I needed a tow truck,
this would be a great truck for it.
So definitely hope all of you enjoyed this video.
I know we had a lot of fun filming it, taking it off road.
I'd love to do this a lot more often with you guys
so make sure and stay tuned in guys.
If you are looking for a new set of Wrangler dirt tracks,
wheels, suspension, whatever it may be,
make sure and head on over to our website
trailbuiltoffroad.com.
Other than that, we appreciate all of you for watching
and all of your support.
I'm Josh from Trailbuilt
and we'll see you guys out on the trail.
(cool guitar music)