Ram 1000 Reviews

The Ram 1500 Limited is the flagship of the facelifted pick-up range.

The $141,950 Ram 1500 Laramie Sport is the entry point to the facelifted pick-up line-up, now that the previous entry level Bighorn is still to be facelifted for Australia.

The Ram 1500 has become a firm favourite among Aussie fans of massive US-style pick-up tricks. But has dropping the V8 in favour of an inline six-cylinder unit had a negative or positive impact on the overall package?

You might not be too late for a Ram V8 - but you better be quick and your options might be limited.

It may be faster and more powerful than the ‘Hemi’ V8-powered model it replaces but the big question is whether the in-line six-cylinder MY25 Ram 1500 maintains its well-established ‘tough truck' aura with two fewer cylinders under the bonnet.

US pick-ups are all the rage in Australia and with a full-sized Toyota Tundra a fresh arrival, fans of these big utes are about to be even more spoiled for choice.

News this week broke that Standards Australia have begun a push to have our parking spaces enlarged to better fit the giant, mostly American vehicles now crowding our roads.

The beefed up V8-powered Ram 1500 TRX exited stage left in 2024.Now reports from the US claim it is making a comeback and will be more powerful and pumped up than ever before.US publication, Mopar Insiders, said the Ram TRX will make a comeback in 2026 with V8 power rather than the twin-turbo inline six-cylinder grunt in the new 1500.The outlet reported it could use a reworked version of its former 6.4-litre Hemi Hellcat V8 that ups power to 535kW or it could possibly get the uprated Hellcat Redeye engine that pushes power to a whopping 594kW.The report stems from a leaked email from a Dodge dealer in the US, which also showed the 5.7-litre V8 would be returning to the line-up. That engine made 291kW and 556Nm in the previous generation 1500.The move to re-install the Hemi V8 in the fast selling American pick-up truck is washing away one of the changes enacted by controversial former Stellantis boss Carlos Tavares.Stellantis is in a world of hurt as sales dip in most major markets and a return to its old ways is believed to be the way out of the hole Ram and Jeep find themselves in. Ram’s new boss Tim Kuniskis has been very open about his desire for a new product and a return to the glory years.Kuniskis said he wants a smaller ute to rival the Ford Ranger and Toyota HiLux. It is likely it’ll be called the Dakota.It is likely that the new mid-size ‘Dakota’ would be made exclusively in left-hand-drive, but local factory-backed 'remanufactured' conversion is now very popular. RAM Trucks Australia General Manager Jeff Barber previously said, "A mid-size ute is on our wish list for RAM in Australia. We think it would be a great fit for Australia."

Ram’s global CEO, Tim Kuniski, is so excited about the brand’s upcoming range-extender pick-up it is rushing to release it ahead of its fully-electric sibling.After it was announced in 2023, the Ramcharger 1500 will launch in the US in the second half of the year, with order books poised to open before the middle of 2025.The launch of the battery electric version will be pushed back to 2026 – the Ramcharger’s initial launch date.“I think this is really going to be a secret weapon in the industry,” an enthusiastic Kuniskis said, according to Motor1.“It's why we wanted to share it with you as soon as possible. It's not a PowerPoint slide. This thing is real, and it's coming fast."The Ramcharger 1500 uses a Pentastar 3.6-litre V6 petrol engine generator to charge its 91.8kWh battery pack that in turn powers two electric motors that are solely for propulsion.In addition to a 102-litre petrol tank, the brand claims it will deliver a staggering 1100km of driving range once all battery and fuel capacity is exhausted.Power and torque are quoted at 482kW/827Nm, and despite it nearly weighing an almighty 3500kg, Ram claims it will still sprint from 0-60m/ph (0-98km/h) in just 4.5 seconds.To accommodate the much larger powertrain, Ram said it has widened its STLA Frame undercarriage by eight inches compared to a regular 1500.Three drive modes will be available: Electric+, E-Save and Eco. Electric+ will only use petrol power once the battery is fully depleted, which takes about 226km. Once that happens, the petrol engine will kick in to power the generator that powers the front and rear axle electric motors.The petrol motor generator can add some power to the battery if it dips below 50 per cent charge but cannot fully charge it.In E-Save mode, the engine will turn on and maintain the battery at its current state of charge while driving. It is designed for when electric-only operation is required later, such as entering an urban zero-emissions zone.Eco, meanwhile, takes the most energy conservative approach by reducing available horsepower and dialling down the amount of power spent on air conditioning.At no point will the petrol engine power the wheels – it only powers a built-in generator that powers the wheels. If at any point, however, you require the full range of power and torque, the engine and its petrol generator will be active.Pricing hasn’t been confirmed yet, although Ram said it is aiming for parity with the new petrol 1500 in the US, which will be powered by the new V6 Hurricane engine.The new petrol 1500 hasn’t launched in Australia yet, so it is difficult to make an accurate estimation on pricing, although the previous V8 Hemi 1500 started at around the $120,000 mark.Ateco, Ram’s Australian distributor, has previously said it is exploring the Ramcharger for Australia. CarsGuide has contacted it for a further update. An update to the story will follow with a response.

Think buying the biggest, baddest ute or SUV will keep you safe in a crash? Think again.New research from the US Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), which performs a similar role to the Australasian New Car Assessment Program (ANCAP) in Australia, shows a bigger car does not necessarily translate to it being the safest.The research was conducted in the US, which is a country that knows a thing or two about super-sized vehicles. The IIHS examined crashes involving two vehicles that involved either SUVs or pick-up trucks over a roughly 10 year period to examine fatality rates. The vehicles also had to be between one and four years old at the time of the accident to present a proper like-for-like crash comparison.It found if your car was lighter than the fleet average there was an increased risk of a fatal accident, but no matter how much heavier than the average your vehicle was than the average it posed very little benefit, according to the data.The average weight for a  vehicle in the US is about 2270kg, which is about the same as thef the average dual-cab ute such as the Toyota HiLux or Ford Ranger.The research found the heavier vehicle the more danger it posed to others in a crash. For every roughly 225kg above the fleet average the rate of fatalities dropped by only one per million registered vehicles, while increasing the fatality rate of the other vehicle by seven.“For American drivers, the conventional wisdom is that if bigger is safer, even bigger must be safer still,” IIHS President David Harkey said. “These results show that isn’t true today. Not for people in other cars. And — this is important — not for the occupants of the large vehicles themselves.”Australian vehicles are on average smaller than those in America, but that is changing as a new wave of super-sized vehicles are gaining traction Down Under.Aussies now have the choice of four different US-style pick-up trucks: the Ram 1500, Chevrolet Silverado, Ford F-150 and Toyota Tundra.The GMC Yukon, which is bigger than any SUV currently on sale, arrives later this year.Each generation of vehicle generally grows in every direction, slowly bringing up the fleet average.The head of ANCAP Carla Hoorweg told CarsGuide last year it had concerns about the proliferation of giant utes on our roads.“We’ve definitely got concerns. There are a lot of community concerns we are fielding,” said Hoorweg.“We’re looking at vehicles that are being designed for the US market, they’re not necessarily going to have a focus on pedestrian protection or vulnerable road user protection, that’s not a focus in those regulations. So we know there’s going to be a gap there.”“We are considering what our options are around physical testing, so there’s potential for pedestrian impact testing,” she said.This test involves firing adult and child head forms and leg forms at the bonnet, windscreen, front bumper of a vehicle to determine how well it can physically protect pedestrians from serious head, pelvis and leg injury.ANCAP’s new focus comes as its US equivalent, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), plans to crackdown on large pick-ups, SUVs and vans after pedestrian fatalities rose by 57 per cent between 2013 and 2022.