I want to beef up my v6, with a different air in take system, changing the exhaust to a dual exhaust, adding a performance chip, changing spark plugs and wires and changing the throttle body. Will doing any of this stuff really work??? If not any suggestions would be great.
You may get some gains, but to what end? Do you want it to be faster? To tow more? This is a light truck, and it simply wasn’t designed to be speedy or haul a lot. Even the V8 equipped Dakotas weren’t really equipped to handle the extra HP very well. If you insist on trying to make this truck faster, budget some money for better brakes, shocks, etc. And I don’t know if there’s a lot of performance parts for a 3.9 liter.
Your money might be better spent on a bigger truck or quicker car.
Agree with oblivion. I have a 2002 Extended Cab Dakota with the 3.9 and automatic transmission. It’s not a performance vehicle and can never be one. Save your money and buy a bigger truck as oblivion has already suggested.
Your truck will sound cooler, look cooler, and your wallet will be a lot lighter. Faster? Not much. You’d need to run a dyno test before and after each modification to confirm any gains. It is possible you will get less power too.
Changing spark plugs and wires will have -0- impact. Most performance chips show no gain, some allow higher rpm before imposing a rev limiter but that’s about it. The air intake claims are unproven, and the K&N filters are pricey, need cleaning and re-oiling and if over oiled actually can be more restrictive than the OEM paper filters. The K&N set up has a nicer intake sound, that’s about all, questionable gains in performance.
The dual exhaust shows some evidence of a performance gain, but at a steep price. Look nice and sound great so go for it for those reasons, but don’t expect any real 0-60 improvement. The increase sound makes you feel you are going faster, the stopwatch doesn’t bear it out.