This page includes various problems R/T owners have had
My car has gone though 7 or 8 timing belts in 55K miles.  However, this appears
to have been due to a flaw in the crank sprocket which has now been replaced.
Even so, it's very important to keep a close eye on belt tension.

Head gasket blew at 50K miles.

Replaced leaking cam cover gaskets not long before 50K miles.

Melted turbo oil return line at 54K miles - replaced with added heat insulation.

Began blowing off vacuum/pressure lines after head gasket replacement - used
tie-wraps to hold lines in place.

Cracked/broken valley cover (heat related).  Cracked air intake duct.  Cracked
upper timing belt cover.

This head gets _real_ hot, and holds the heat for a long time.  Don't try to
change the spark plugs unless the car has been sitting overnight.


Take the VIN to your dealer, and have him run a "function 70" to check for
open recalls, service campaigns, and such on this car.  The core plugs in
the valley should have been replaced with aluminum - check them with a magnet.
The oil pump and a few other items depending on production date should have
been replaced.

I'd recommend seeing about an extended service contract if you get the car -
I wish I had.

Even so, there's not much I'd trade my R/T for, especially considering that
it's an economical commuter as well as extremely powerful and it handles well.
I think I'm getting the PO bugs worked out...

David Wright                    65 Plymouth Belvedere II 4-door 273-2
dwrig@tog-1s.hac.com            74 Dodge Challenger Rallye 360-4
"16 valves - no waiting"        92 Dodge Daytona IROC R/T 2.2 Turbo III

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On Tue, 20 Jan 1998, Abbott, Mike G. wrote:

 >Head gasket replaced three times, by three different dealers, and head
 >milled to correct warpage; engine still has an antifreeze leak
 >somewhere.

Goodness.  Shortly after I bought a Chrysler Added Care service contract
on my (then-77kmile) '91 Spirit R/T, Emich Dodge replaced the head gasket
(and associated ancillaries) to stop a coolant leak at the passenger side
rear.  At that time, I changed to Dex-Cool coolant [UPDATE, 4/5/05 from
Daniel Stern:  PLEASE REMOVE ALL RECOMMENDATIONS TO USE DEX-COOL IMMEDIATELY!
It is very much *not* compatible with Mopar radiators, heater cores
and head gaskets, and it took a long and expensive string of component
failures before I figured this out. The orange stuff Mopar changed to
in '99 was not Dex-Cool, it was G-05, which is now available on the
aftermarket and is an excellent and compatible choice]...  I replaced the timing
belt at that time just on general principle.  Mine's never been noisy.

 >Clutch burnt out and was replaced with a dealer-installed new one. The
 >new one chatters and causes rougher shifting.

Clutch went out (mother drove car for a year) and I ordered up the new
clutch kit from Chrysler (made in Canada by Valeo, includes cover and
disc). Also bought a new throwout bearing (the old one was a bit noisy)
and clutch cable (general principle) and Ed Peters solid rear torque strut
(to replace the dumb toy plastic pretend shock absorber--best mod I ever
did!)   Emich Dodge did the work and revealed their secret to perfect
clutch jobs:  ALWAYS have the flywheel resurfaced *with a stone*, not on
a cutter.  They say they discovered this early in the production cycle of
the new Ram trucks with Cummins Turbodiesels and five-speeds.  They must
be right, because this new factory clutch would rival that in a brand-new
Mercedes for smoothness.


 >The water pump started leaking antifreeze and was replaced.

I put in a new Airtex shortly after I bought the R/T.  Had a very slight
seepage leak and the PO had broken off one of the studs.  See comments
above re: Dex-Cool, which incidentally Chrysler has begun using this year.

 >The wiring harness that the O2 sensor is connected to melted and had to
 >be replaced.

You too?  This happened in my driveway.  Drove the car to the grocery
store, parked at home, went to use it 10 minutes later...nothing.  Not
even a check engine light.  I spent an hour and a half doing diagnosis
(with a little help from my friends) and another hour and a half replacing
the melted fusible link and making a new 4-wire O2 sensor out of
high-temperature wire salvaged from an oven we replaced a few years ago.
I triple wrapped it in aluminum tape and routed it ABOVE the air cleaner
baseplate.  Problem solved.

 >The insides of the catalytic converter broke up, partially plugging the
 >exhaust system.    

Haven't had this failure.  

 >The timing belt has been replaced once and adjusted 4 times because of
 >excessive noise and currently is noisier than ever.

I believe you should obtain new sprockets.  Early sprockets had problems
like this and eat timing belts.  Mine can't be heard.

 >The tape player crapped out and was replaced by another (used)
 >radio/cassette unit that quickly crapped out. Now has a unit from a '95 Caravan.

Mine had the base line tape player.  Replaced it for no particular reason
(other than snob appeal...) with a CD/FM/AM/Tape unit from a '97 LHS.

Daniel Stern

-------------------------------------------------


 1. It shifts into reverse HARD!  I know the clutch is fully disengaging,
 because there is no problem rowing between any of the five forward gears.
 But when I pull the shift lever back into 'R', gears grind and I can feel
 the entire engine rocking.  At 80K miles, are the mounts possibly worn out?

A568s are hard to shift into reverse.  The correct procedure is second
nature to me now:  Shift it as far into reverse as it wants to go, then,
while continuing to move the lever towards reverse, begin to let up on the
clutch.  The lever will slot into Reverse with no grinding.
 
Daniel Stern

-------------------------------------------------


From RACERRRRX@aol.com:

Hi dudes: I'm a fellow Spirit R/T owner. I replaced the head gasket,head
plugs(steel ones), I put on about 4k since these changes, I noticed the
coolant level is lowering & there is a faint aroma of antifreeze @ times.
When the gasket went I noticed a white stream travelling down the block near # 2
cylinder. I do not see any stains there now.I think it might be the turbo
coolant lines? Any suggestions?-Thanks in advance


Michael,

    How many miles do you have on your Spirit?  The reason I ask it this:
Chrysler's FWD radiators are notoriously crappy.  They tend to leak from the
side tanks quite often, and sometimes the leak is so small it goes
unnoticed.  On my mother's 89 Turbo Caravan, the radiator was leaking from
the right tank.  I could smeel coolant when the van had warmed up, and the
level was going down, but I could never find out where it was coming from.
Then I discovered tracer dyes...

Wes Grueninger
'98 Saturn SL2, '91 Spirit R/T, '87 LeBaron GTS
'85 Omni GLH-T, '85 4x4 S-10 Blazer

-------------------------------------------


Still own it, still gradually uncovering and fixing bugs from the previous
owners and dealers.  I'm the third owner.  Frequent timing belt failure (on
belt number 7 or so since new, at 53K miles) appears to have been due to a flaw
in the crank timing gear, which I've replaced.  Blew the head gasket at about
50K.  Mechanic missed at least one vacuum line when putting back together,
still checking for others but power's now back up pretty close to "before".  
Dealers appear to have buffed through the clearcoat on the top surfaces as they
"detailed" it.  Oil leak at rocker covers fixed.  New oil leak at turbo oil
return.  Broke the strut that holds the air box to the engine.  Valley cover
heat-cracked.  But gradually better and better (started out great) as I uncover
and fix little details.

David Wright                    65 Plymouth Belvedere II 4-door 273-2
dwrig@tog-1s.hac.com            74 Dodge Challenger Rallye 360-4
"16 valves - no waiting"        92 Dodge Daytona IROC R/T 2.2 Turbo III



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