Used 2012 Dodge Durango Citadel 4dr SUV (3.6L 6cyl 5A) Consumer Reviews

I'll Never Buy Another Dodge

I'm so disappointed to write this review. We bought the 2012 V8 Citadel which, was mentioned in another review, is not listed in the trim options for this review. I have a friend that had an older model Dodge Durango. He had horrible issues with the transmission but I had heard those issues went away with the newer redesign. We had just sold a Saturn Outlook that let us down and this was the car that we expected to come and redeem us. However, Dodge Corporate and the dealer totally ruined that experience for us. We purchased our car and had to have the transmission totally rebuilt within the the first 20,000 miles of ownership. It was a major concern but luckily our warranties(both factory and the extended we purchased) protected us. Then in 2016 our Durango began randomly stalling on us. It started out random at very long intervals but the intervals began to decrease. The dealer seemed uninterested in addressing the issue at all. Soon enough, the car began stalling while we were on major highways which caused a huge safety concern for us. The dealer kept the car for a day but couldn't reproduce the problem. Finally, the car stopped three times within 4 weeks. We tried getting Dodge corporate involved. Even though we owned two warranties Dodge claimed they couldn't fix our car because there was diag code. As we researched the problem, we found out that there had been a recall for this very issue for our year model but our VIN# was just outside of the recall. The problem was so bad that Dodge was buying back vehicles with the same symptoms we were having but by the time we found out the window to have your vehicle purchased had already passed. For owners who chose to keep their vehicles they were replacing the TIPM (this part is a huge problem with thousands of Daimler Chrysler vehicles). Dodge, AutoNation Katy(the new owners of the dealership where we purchased our car), and the Service dept all refused to replace both the fuel relay (another recalled item previously replaced on our car) and the TIPM. After numerous trips to the dealership, certified letters, multiple phone calls and meetings, and service appointments we finally met with the Area Manager. When we told him we wanted a new TIPM he said, "Oh, that's all you want!". Yes! That's all I want so my family can avoid imminent death in this death trap. We realized that all manufacturers have issues but I can't even estimate how much lost time, work hours, and gas is gone for both parties when some knucklehead could've just said, "Fine. We'll replace this part. Hopefully this will work. If not, we'll see where we need to go from there." Dodge makes beautiful paperweights; nothing more, nothing less.