Advice on Roadtrek 190 / 1997 - 2002

[rowiebowie]

Originally Posted by 2002Roadtrek190

I have an ‘02 190 and it’s been great and at 100,000 runs strong.

Welcome to the forum!

I've said it before, the old Dodges seem to run forever. Many owners, like yourself, are very satisfied.

[vwmaniaman]

With my 1999 Dodge LTV widebody Freedom, it had the squirrely steering too. It has the Firestone air bags in back and Bilstein shocks that I added. I also added 2" spacers on the rear axle. These additions helped plus i did the steering box adjustment too. It has the hydraulic stabilizer on the front already. One thing that I did notice different between my 1993 Roadtrek and this 1999 LTV is that the rear springs on the Roadtrek has 7 leaves and the LTV has only 5 leaves. The Roadtrek doesn't have the rear spacers or the steering stabilizer yet fells much more connected to the road. We did however take the LTV to Florida this past spring with 5 people and their luggage and had no complaints about stability and my wife even drove it some. Maybe with a few more add on pieces you will be comfortable and enjoy relaxed driving.

[Jay]

I had to get a new Redhead Steering box for my Dodge 98 Roadtrek. It was well worth it as now it handles very well at 65. Before the replacement, I was leary of going over 55, and some roads were hell. My advice: don't hesitate to replace the steering box: I got mine installed at Les Schwab for under $800. This is a well documented issue for the Dodge models.

[Jay]

Does anyone know what the actual shade of white color is for this era of white Roadtrek? The fiberglass top is off-white, and I'd like to get some good paint for it to redo above the decals, preferably spray paint cans, but anything that works!

[Pam G]

Originally Posted by Jay

Does anyone know what the actual shade of white color is for this era of white Roadtrek? The fiberglass top is off-white, and I'd like to get some good paint for it to redo above the decals, preferably spray paint cans, but anything that works!

Jay,
You might want to post your message as a new thread so more people will see it and respond.

Pam

[Stevemo]

One thing to watch out for the final years of the Dodge Vans with OBD-II computers is "No Bus" coming up on the dash. The connectors on the computers are problematic which leads to a lot of problems.

I bought a RedHead steering box for my 1991 Dodge Roadtrek and it was junk. It came with the wrong oil in it and wandered all over the place just like the original one. Their customer support was me talking to the person who rebuilt it and they told me it was normal. The final solution was that I sold the van to somebody who had a rusted out 1992 Roadtrek and he put the 1992 box in the 1991 van I sold him.

I would not buy from RedHead unless you buy it through an installer who will hold them accountable for warranty. It's one of the tougher DIY jobs and you may need to do it multiple times so just buy it through a mechanic and plan for lots of downtime.

[booster]

Originally Posted by Stevemo

One thing to watch out for the final years of the Dodge Vans with OBD-II computers is "No Bus" coming up on the dash. The connectors on the computers are problematic which leads to a lot of problems.

I bought a RedHead steering box for my 1991 Dodge Roadtrek and it was junk. It came with the wrong oil in it and wandered all over the place just like the original one. Their customer support was me talking to the person who rebuilt it and they told me it was normal. The final solution was that I sold the van to somebody who had a rusted out 1992 Roadtrek and he put the 1992 box in the 1991 van I sold him.

I would not buy from RedHead unless you buy it through an installer who will hold them accountable for warranty. It's one of the tougher DIY jobs and you may need to do it multiple times so just buy it through a mechanic and plan for lots of downtime.

That is very interesting as I have heard of very few issues with the Redhead ones. What oil did it have in it?

[Stevemo]

It had red oil in it instead of the clear Mopar hydraulic oil. Nobody makes a substitute for this oil so it must have been some random fluid that they had in their test rig. Using ATF in this system is perilous as it is really aggressive in a 20 year old vehicle. I tried it once and within a week the ATF had turned grey despite it replacing clear fluid.

The problem I ran into with the steering gear was that it seemed to have a solid output shaft free of deflection but it deflected a lot when hooked up with the pitman arm. The end result was I still had over a quarter of a turn of lash at the steering wheel as the shaft moved side to side. The entire front end of the van was new so there was no question on the cause of the lash and I couldn't see the seal lasting a long time either.

At the time I had two Roadtreks and couldn't guarantee that I'd be able to make the van any better than it already was so it was decided to cut the value of the van by $500 and abandon dealing with Redhead. The good thing in the whole situation was that the 1992 that the buyer was scrapping had an excellent driveline and steering gear. He contacted me some time after buying the van and let me know that his part unit the van.

As a side note, they make a lot of fuss about returning the old steering gear without bleeding fluid all over the place during shipping. When I picked up mine from the UPS store the box was torn to pieces and packing peanuts trailing behind me. I didn't realize what was happening until I got to my vehicle so I spent 10 minutes cleaning up the parking lot and store...

[booster]

Originally Posted by Stevemo

It had red oil in it instead of the clear Mopar hydraulic oil. Nobody makes a substitute for this oil so it must have been some random fluid that they had in their test rig. Using ATF in this system is perilous as it is really aggressive in a 20 year old vehicle. I tried it once and within a week the ATF had turned grey despite it replacing clear fluid.

The problem I ran into with the steering gear was that it seemed to have a solid output shaft free of deflection but it deflected a lot when hooked up with the pitman arm. The end result was I still had over a quarter of a turn of lash at the steering wheel as the shaft moved side to side. The entire front end of the van was new so there was no question on the cause of the lash and I couldn't see the seal lasting a long time either.

At the time I had two Roadtreks and couldn't guarantee that I'd be able to make the van any better than it already was so it was decided to cut the value of the van by $500 and abandon dealing with Redhead. The good thing in the whole situation was that the 1992 that the buyer was scrapping had an excellent driveline and steering gear. He contacted me some time after buying the van and let me know that his part unit the van.

As a side note, they make a lot of fuss about returning the old steering gear without bleeding fluid all over the place during shipping. When I picked up mine from the UPS store the box was torn to pieces and packing peanuts trailing behind me. I didn't realize what was happening until I got to my vehicle so I spent 10 minutes cleaning up the parking lot and store...

I think there is a specific oil number for at least some of the power steering setups, others used ATF and had for decades. In the early manual gears they even used ATF in the them. Generally, ATF isn't an issue for power steering and often an improvement. I use Dex 4 Amsoil in our Chevy Roadtrek for instance and it improved to performance of the steering and hydroboost brakes.


The loose shaft is very common in the Dodges but I think you can adjust it out like on other gears by adjusting the pinion bearings. Many have had good results by adding the external shaft support they sell for many of the years.



Redhead probably tests the gears with ATF or one of the power steering fluids that are red. I am surprised it came with oil in it at all but that should mean it was on the test bench and should have been good.