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2012Oudoorsman's avatar
Mar 25, 2016

New Truck 2016 RAM 3500 CCLB

Picked up my new truck on March 1st. It's a 2016 RAM 3500 CCLB Bighorn Cummins/Aisin. Ordered it Dec 26 and came in on Feb. 29. Worked perfect for me as we were mostly through the winter and no real salt was put down due to the mild winter.

Truck has a payload of 4039lbs and a gvwr of 12300. Pretty heavey at 8251lbs but im getting about 2mpg or so better than my 2012 RAM 1500 Outdoorsman with the 5.7l and 3.92 gears.

Haven't really used it yet but I can tell that it will be a huge improvement over the 1500. The 7500lb TT isn't really going to work it but I ordered the truck to be ready for when we upgrade to a fifth wheel.

A couple things I've noticed.

Ride is noticeable stiffer than my FIL 2012 F350 Scab LB and my friends 2013 F350 Screw LB. I aired down tires but still stiffer.

Everything I disliked with my 2012 changed. Location of trailer brake controller and gear selection now also tells you what gear you're in.

The Exhaust brake is awesome but I don't think this will be necessary for me. We do have decent hills but I haven't been on when on the interstate that I accelerates down. This may change when my gvwr FL goes from 13,500 lbs to over 20,000 with a new fifth wheel.

I think it really needs an upper overload like the F350s. With a tounge weight of 750-800lbs it dropped an inch and only had an inch left in the rake before being level. With a payload of 4000lbs I can't imagine it won't sag a good amount. The true test will be when I start loading some green oak firewood on it and we'll see.

  • Congrats! That's a nice payload for a SRW diesel. Good travels with it.
  • Congrats, helluva capable rig.

    My experience with my MY16 SRW 3500 (there's three of us with that truck on this thread) is that the first thousand pounds sees the most squat relative to capacity. I think that's to provide an acceptable ride empty. So you noticed c.1" with 800 lbs weight but that won't change to near the same degree until you start getting closer to the 4,100 lb max capacity.

    Basically what I'm saying is don't worry about your headlights touching the sky on a stock SRW 3500 unlike people with leveled trucks who hookup a trailer.
  • Great looking truck! We just up graded from our 2012 2500 Mega Cab Hemi to the 2016 3500 CCSB Big Horn Cummins.

    We can't wait to see how it does with our fifth wheel. 12,000lbs. We are to curious to see how much our trailer makes the truck squat.
    I was thinking the same thing they finally put the trailer brake in the right spot.
    We actually thought it rose a bit nicer than our previous truck.
    But we don't drive it very much unless moving our 5er or our ATV trailer. Had it just about a month only has 450 miles on it.
    Pull your trailer like it's not even there.
  • Nice looking truck there. I myself have a 3500 LB on order myself. As this will be my first Ram and diesel too boot, I've been reading the many Ram truck forums to learn as much as I can about the running and maintainence of this truck. One thing that keeps coming up is that we should run these trucks with the EB on all the time. Others say that it warms the engine up much faster and it keeps the engine running cleaner over the long run. Others here will have more knowledge on that I'm sure.
  • Nice truck, congrats. I wish I knew about the longer steps when I got mine, they sure would come in handy.