Lonesoldier79
03-24-2016, 01:33 AM
I bought my RT in June of 2010 from an old Mennonite guy in Hatfield, PA for $4,500. He had a small mechanical shop and he used it as his daily driver. I didn't know anything about Dakota RT's at the time, but it had 80,000 miles on it and had a V8. I was originally looking for a S-10 or a Ranger to haul power tools and hand tools for work, because I was tired of using my car trunk and it didn't have enough space to carry my ever expanding inventory of tools I needed to keep with me. I met that old man at a dinner one night eating dinner with other guys on my crew. The old man overheard us talking about me looking for a truck and he came over and offered to sell his Dakota RT. The next day I went to take a look at it and take a test drive. I went straight to the bank and pulled out the cash right afterwards :jester:
Shortly after buying it I started looking around on the internet for cheap easy mods to do and I found Dakotart.com. I asked typical noob questions and got the typical noob responses back. A few guys like Adobedave and Huskerrt79 gave me some good ideas and I started saving for parts from there. My original intention with the truck was to just make it fun to drive. Like most of us it's never enough and you want more. So, I started saving for more and better parts.
Fast forward 2 years I decided the RT was no longer going to be my daily and I wanted to get semi serious with it. I wanted to do a complete refresh of the engine while upgrading the heads and cam and have the trans rebuilt. I was shooting for 300whp at that time and after a couple of years saving up for more parts like an M1, 52mm TB, SCT, Wheels and built trans from Chris Orlando, exhaust and a bunch of suspension stuff it was time to start the process in December of 14. I spent a month rebuilding the truck and when it was said and done I hit my goal at 305whp. Around that time Jason Thompson was offering his Paxton kit for a steal and I was lucky enough to scoop it up being semi local to each other. That set the next build in motion....
I called up Chris at PIE to build me a forged FI-360 with the goal of making a 600whp totally street RT that I could beat on all day long and not have to worry. Despite some negative things that had been said, I decided to go with him being a supported vendor and knowing other guys who had success with him building their engines. And he would let me pay what I could when I could. The build finished last August and I was able to run it at last years Nats. Though it wasn't as fast as we had hoped, it still made it through the shakedown with no issues.
Present day it has recently been repainted Tuxedo black and the bed linexed. I have other plans in the works, but life always finds a way to slow down progress :dumbass234: Thank you for the nomination and
considering my truck for TOTQ. Below are a few pics from over the years to show how the APE has changed
13172131731317413175
Shortly after buying it I started looking around on the internet for cheap easy mods to do and I found Dakotart.com. I asked typical noob questions and got the typical noob responses back. A few guys like Adobedave and Huskerrt79 gave me some good ideas and I started saving for parts from there. My original intention with the truck was to just make it fun to drive. Like most of us it's never enough and you want more. So, I started saving for more and better parts.
Fast forward 2 years I decided the RT was no longer going to be my daily and I wanted to get semi serious with it. I wanted to do a complete refresh of the engine while upgrading the heads and cam and have the trans rebuilt. I was shooting for 300whp at that time and after a couple of years saving up for more parts like an M1, 52mm TB, SCT, Wheels and built trans from Chris Orlando, exhaust and a bunch of suspension stuff it was time to start the process in December of 14. I spent a month rebuilding the truck and when it was said and done I hit my goal at 305whp. Around that time Jason Thompson was offering his Paxton kit for a steal and I was lucky enough to scoop it up being semi local to each other. That set the next build in motion....
I called up Chris at PIE to build me a forged FI-360 with the goal of making a 600whp totally street RT that I could beat on all day long and not have to worry. Despite some negative things that had been said, I decided to go with him being a supported vendor and knowing other guys who had success with him building their engines. And he would let me pay what I could when I could. The build finished last August and I was able to run it at last years Nats. Though it wasn't as fast as we had hoped, it still made it through the shakedown with no issues.
Present day it has recently been repainted Tuxedo black and the bed linexed. I have other plans in the works, but life always finds a way to slow down progress :dumbass234: Thank you for the nomination and
considering my truck for TOTQ. Below are a few pics from over the years to show how the APE has changed
13172131731317413175