Power Wagon Registry

Hello all, I have been off the boards for a while because I ended up selling my latest PW for a Ram SRT-10. I miss going offroad though so going to come back to the arena very soon. However, I got a taste of a Turbo Cummins that my dad bought and fell in love with the diesel, both the power/torque and the MPG's. On the flip side, I want to be able to rockcrawl and offroad heavily, which is where the PW lives.

So, I'm sure this has been basically answered before but I couldn't find it with a search so sorry if I start another post on this. If I were to buy a 4th gen 2500 with diesel, Mega Cab, how much would it cost to put all the specific PW parts on the stock 2500? Ooooh, well I guess I won't be able to use the stock PW springs as they won't hold the weight of the diesel, but everything else I think should bolt up ok, right? Basically, I'd want the same lockers, sway disconnect, articulation that a PW has, and skids, on a MegaCab Cummins. Is it possible?

On a side note, I'm hearing rumors that Ram "might" be listening to us finally and will offer the Cummins in the upcoming PW's. If I get confirmation of this, I will wait and buy that for sure.

Don't think that there will be a diesel PW. Because the winch sits in the same place that the intercooler would be located at. Plus the diesel weight on the front axle.

The PW axles are doable. Find a set in a junk yard that isn't bent or buy new. Would have to hard wire the lockers. What I would do, is get a 4.5G 11.5 rear axle. Cut all of the brackets off of it. Like the coil spring perches, track bar bracket. And weld leaf spring perches on it. Change the gearing to 5.13's front and rear. Can't do that with the 10.5.

The smart bar. That's a wiring harness nightmare I would guess. Better off using quick connect sway bar links like on a Jeep.

Suspension. Wide open. Thuren, and Carli would be your best bet.

Winch. You will have to use an aftermarket Jay Leno chin bumper. Can't install the winch in the frame like a PW because of the intercooler.

Skid plates. The PW frame is different from the 2500 frame. Has it's own part number. The frame is drilled for all the skid plate brackets, where the 2500 is not. You would need someone's PW vin number to get the brackets and drill the hole yourself.

Get the Cummins mega and just do arb lockers and a Thuren or Carli torsion swaybar along with whatever suspension floats your boat. A mercenary bumper will fit a large frame warn winch without sticking out a half mile.

If you go with a 3500 the leaf spring rear allows fitment of 3” shocks/bypasses if you care about such things. You’re limited to 2.5 non bypass on the coil rear.

Colibri wrote: ↑

Thu Aug 23, 2018 11:58 am

Get the Cummins mega and just do arb lockers and a Thuren or Carli torsion swaybar along with whatever suspension floats your boat. A mercenary bumper will fit a large frame warn winch without sticking out a half mile.

If you go with a 3500 the leaf spring rear allows fitment of 3” shocks/bypasses if you care about such things. You’re limited to 2.5 non bypass on the coil rear.

In other words... $15k in parts and labor.

Colibri wrote:Get the Cummins mega and just do arb lockers and a Thuren or Carli torsion swaybar along with whatever suspension floats your boat. A mercenary bumper will fit a large frame warn winch without sticking out a half mile.

If you go with a 3500 the leaf spring rear allows fitment of 3” shocks/bypasses if you care about such things. You’re limited to 2.5 non bypass on the coil rear.

This. The PW itself is full of compromises, and if you aren’t starting from a PW, you have a chance to improve in a couple areas.

Do ARB air lockers. Size your air system so you have onboard air. 4.88 or 5.13 gears.

Find a dead take-off PW Smart Bar, pull out the solenoid, replace it with the EVO Mfg air actuator.

Air lockers, air swaybar, onboard air. Air everything.

Carli or Thuren, yup.

Mercenary winch bumper, yup.

White Knuckle makes sliders for megacabs.

Not sure what size tank is on a mega Cummins, the PW tank is 31 gallons. Looks like the mega wheelbase is 10” or 11” longer than the PW, so the PW skids won’t fit right in (and you’d have to do some drilling if they did). If you’re serious about skids, you’re better off having something fabricated. The PW extra crossmember is weak anyway, they get bent if you use them.


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Low_Sky wrote: ↑

Thu Aug 23, 2018 1:40 pm

Colibri wrote:Get the Cummins mega and just do arb lockers and a Thuren or Carli torsion swaybar along with whatever suspension floats your boat. A mercenary bumper will fit a large frame warn winch without sticking out a half mile.

If you go with a 3500 the leaf spring rear allows fitment of 3” shocks/bypasses if you care about such things. You’re limited to 2.5 non bypass on the coil rear.

This. The PW itself is full of compromises, and if you aren’t starting from a PW, you have a chance to improve in a couple areas.

Do ARB air lockers. Size your air system so you have onboard air. 4.88 or 5.13 gears.

Find a dead take-off PW Smart Bar, pull out the solenoid, replace it with the EVO Mfg air actuator.

Air lockers, air swaybar, onboard air. Air everything.

Carli or Thuren, yup.

Mercenary winch bumper, yup.

White Knuckle makes sliders for megacabs.

Not sure what size tank is on a mega Cummins, the PW tank is 31 gallons. Looks like the mega wheelbase is 10” or 11” longer than the PW, so the PW skids won’t fit right in (and you’d have to do some drilling if they did). If you’re serious about skids, you’re better off having something fabricated. The PW extra crossmember is weak anyway, they get bent if you use them.


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I'd rather install OE PW electric lockers. 4.88 and 5.13 gears are too low for a Cummins truck.

Low_sky has a good idea with the take off smartbar + evo. That’s certainly a good alternative to a torsion bar.

I’d wager you’d be happier with 4.56 gears if on 37’s, which is a point in favor of swapping oem power wagon axles in if you can find them, oh wait, they only come with 4.10’s now lol Good luck with that.

If it comes down to buying lockers for your axles the arb is superior in almost every measurable way to the AAM tracrite gt/gtl
The only benefit the gtl has is it functions as a pretty darn good lsd when not activated. I sometimes miss that feature myself. Otherwise the arb is significantly stronger and more robust, especially in the 9.25 there’s very little price difference between a tracrite and arb if you have to buy new.


As far as cost goes, I’m not his financial advisor lol. Merely trying to help the man achieve his stated goal of having a Cummins powered mega pig rockcrawler.

Something to consider, I have heard the PW swaybar disconnect will not support the additional weight of the diesel motor.

user nts007 has actually done this, though not on that chassis. See his build thread viewtopic.php?f=13&t=636 His part stars on the bottom of page 1

Yeah but that guy’s got a few screws loose

1. You’ll go crazy and broke trying to replicate a factory designed PW in a non-PW truck, especially a diesel.
2. I’d order a 3500 SRW leaf spring quad, not Mega cab, with dual alternators, and the upfitter switch bank
3. Regear it to 4.56 on 37’s or 4.88 on 40’s
4. Install either a Eaton-Detroit (#250SL195A) http://www.eaton.com/ecm/groups/public/ ... 128302.pdf ... or ARB air locker
5. Install custom OBA, plumb to lockers and to quick disco-NPT fittings at all 4 tires, and run the electrical before cutting and welding skids & x-mbrs
6.order thuren king 2.5 extreme kit, specify PW coil height+ boggie bumps (use marcus)
7. Order thuren front axle truss kit
8. Order Purple Cranium rear ½ spider
9. Order Carli front diff-guard
10. Order AEV Wheels
11. Order AEV fender flares for either 37 or 40’s
12. Order AEV winch bumper + LED fogs & light bar
13. Wire lightbar, winch, lockers, and OBA to your factory installed upfitter switches

$15-$20k and you’re Done...and hope the temp doesn’t drop below 32F.

adeluca73 wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 27, 2018 11:53 pm

1. You’ll go crazy and broke trying to replicate a factory designed PW in a non-PW truck, especially a diesel.
2. I’d order a 3500 SRW leaf spring quad, not Mega cab, with dual alternators, and the upfitter switch bank
3. Regear it to 4.56 on 37’s or 4.88 on 40’s
4. Install either a Eaton-Detroit (#250SL195A) http://www.eaton.com/ecm/groups/public/ ... 128302.pdf ... or ARB air locker
5. Install custom OBA, plumb to lockers and to quick disco-NPT fittings at all 4 tires, and run the electrical before cutting and welding skids & x-mbrs
6.order thuren king 2.5 extreme kit, specify PW coil height+ boggie bumps (use marcus)
7. Order thuren front axle truss kit
8. Order Purple Cranium rear ½ spider
9. Order Carli front diff-guard
10. Order AEV Wheels
11. Order AEV fender flares for either 37 or 40’s
12. Order AEV winch bumper + LED fogs & light bar
13. Wire lightbar, winch, lockers, and OBA to your factory installed upfitter switches

$15-$20k and you’re Done...and hope the temp doesn’t drop below 32F.

That's a great - well thought through plan! But man $80k for a truck

So here's a link to my build thread where I'm kiiiinda doing what you're talking about:

viewtopic.php?f=13&t=4510

Everyone's pretty much covered a lot of the finer points so I'll try not to cover anything that hasn't already been stated. To do what you're talking about, I think a 2013 or older 2500 would be the best platform to start with since they have the rear leaf springs and should help cut down on the overall costs. There are some random threads out there on the internet where a few guys have gone through and done the work to get PW skid plates fitted on diesels...but I would say unless you manage to pull the plates from a wreck it would realistically be easier and probably cheaper to just have a local shop fab some up.

The rear locker thing is a bit of a pain...ARB's are definitely the way to go but as stated no LSD when they're not locked like the factory electric. As of right now that's why I'm keeping the factory LSD in the rear...maybe someday down the road I'll screw around with trying a PW locker in the rear but don't want to deal with one electric and one air locker at the moment, that and an open diff rear end on a cummins IMO would be horrible for daily driving...I can barely keep the rear end from trying to pass the front when its just slightly damp out as is.

I'm still throwing around the idea of a winch and mercenary bumper vs. a Thuren bumper...I miss having a winch but at the moment am having a hard time justifying the cost, you're talking in the realm of $6k just for that set up...but there are definitely cheaper routes.

As far as overall cost....its gonna be a fair amount. What route you go with your suspension is going to really be one of the biggest chunks, not to mention the added cost of a diesel alone. If you go the deleted route, which you absolute should...another added cost...if you run any sort of tuner, headstuds. The list goes on and on

If you are talking about capabilities of a stock PW, then a deisel with a thuren overland kit, thuren or carli sway bar, lockers, wheels/35's and a winch is going to be really close to a stock pw. Did the 3/4 or 1 ton dodge ever come with a rear locker? Honestly for my uses I could live without the front locker, for the money it would cost to add that I would rather put the cash into the suspension.

There are some great plans posted above, but to me they look like they go beyond a stock PW. If you want to compare to some of the trucks here then you would need a setup with a full blown suspension with king 2.5's and a Decent pile of $$

The PW value is from the factory. Recreating is expensive. The only thing I would take source from Mopar is the wide frame winch mount (if you have a gasser). Otherwise aftermarket will be cheaper.

Don't get me wrong, I love mine, and would not buy a different truck, but I would only buy 3/4 ton gas crew cabs anyway, so it was a no brainer. (Well, I could see buying a Cummins/G56 combo.) If I had of bought a Ford instead, I was going to do a front ARB, Warn hidden winch mount and likely something similar on suspension to what I'll do on my PW.

ramv wrote: ↑

Mon Sep 03, 2018 5:56 pm

The PW value is from the factory. Recreating is expensive. The only thing I would take source from Mopar is the wide frame winch mount (if you have a gasser). Otherwise aftermarket will be cheaper.

Don't get me wrong, I love mine, and would not buy a different truck, but I would only buy 3/4 ton gas crew cabs anyway, so it was a no brainer. (Well, I could see buying a Cummins/G56 combo.) If I had of bought a Ford instead, I was going to do a front ARB, Warn hidden winch mount and likely something similar on suspension to what I'll do on my PW.

Can't use the factory winch brackets for his build. He's using a diesel. The intercooler is in the same place as the winch would be. He has to use a Jay Leno chin bumper for the winch to clear the intercooler.

This is a tough call, as it seems from my limited research, RAM only allows DRW applications to receive the 4.10 (factory) gear ratio with an Aisin, with 3.42 gears being the only offering with the 68RFE (3.73 w/ DRW) seems pretty ridiculous to me. That's a big-chunk alone just to get proper gearing, although the 3.73's with the improved 1st - 2nd gear in the Aisin (SRW config), would be similar to 4.10's with the 68RFE.

Depends on what you want, like most have posted above, $15,000 into any platform will make it fairly capable. Probably better off keeping the Diesel stock and finding another well-used, abused Wagon for the trails.

OP can buy a set of '14+ PW 4.10 take off gears. I sold mine to a 3rd gen diesel owner.