How many Vans? +1 cheap Promaster project

So. I am smack dab in the middle of a NV1500 van project. And, an ongoing X1/9 project. None of that matters when I see a "2017" Ram Promaster High roof on the marketplace at $800 minimal info and two meh. Pics. "Motor blown, as-is"

It is within an hours drive. I message immediately (possibly during some famous sporting event?) and hear back from the seller. He is understandably getting a lot of messages.

It is Monday now. He wants to be done and I up the bid to $900. Yes! Mine. I immediately head down and pay the man and I will come back for the van later this week. Here is what I have gotten myself into: 

Grill guard apparently went on after hitting some deer. 

Side is rough too. Front passenger tire is flat. 

on the plus side: it is something I can stand up in easily. I'm a tick over 6' without heels and it could be insulated and I don't think it would be too short. 

Mileage? Unknown. 
Title? Yes. Ready to go. 
Problems? Plenty. The engine is rumored to have broken a timing chain. 
Plan? Sort of. Drag it home and replace the engine with one from a journey or caravan. And then, I will figure out what to do with it when it runs. 
Wish me luck

I wish you luck 

Man, so awesome. It's also the widest van option, and the FWD really makes the back able to be configured in so many ways. You are Lucky!

Hell yes! Cheap makes up for ugly. 

I have a trailer reserved for tomorrow. The forecast is for above freezing and sunshine. I will update as the story unfolds. 

GoLucky the vanman... I love it. 

Congrats! Definitely a deal.  I'm not the biggest Promaster fan, but they definitely have their positive attributes.  I believe the engine is basically identical to the ones used in Chrysler minivans, so a used replacement shouldn't be hard to source. 

Today was nice and sunny. A perfect day to get a non-running van. 

My coworker has an Manual '07 Cummins 3500 4x4 and agreed to help me tow. Score! We grabbed the trailer from the rental place and headed down to Butte, about an hour's drive. The van was still where and how I last saw it, so that is nice. We brought a bubble tank and aired up the compeletely flat passenger front tire. I hooked up the jump pack to unlock the column and select Neutral. And WOW this thing has some miles on it.

Okay, okay, that is not KM. That's a lot. Anyway, the interior is horrible and smells like cigarettes, my absolute least favorite situation. But, it is cheap and a Promaster that I already bought so let's get it on the trailer. 

This thing has (now in the cargo area) a grille gaurd booger welded to the bumper support that was the first pull point. We intentionally doubled the strap so there was no way the grille gaurd would hit the truck. The trailer has the $5 damage waiver so... Let's pull this thing out of the snow!

Hahahahahaha! It did move a little bit and then obviously the booger welds let go. I thought my coworker might pee his pants he laughed so hard. With that garbage out of the way I found and installed the tow eye. And, as it turns out, it needed the grill gaurd removed in order to thread into the bumper anyway. Pulling from a secure point we got it out onto the street. 

Next up was connecting the winch to the tow point and pulling the van up onto the trailer. The Promaster takes the entire width of the trailer.

Pretty much maxed out in length as well on this 20ft trailer. 

We were providing entertainment for the gentleman who sat in his window and watched our entire process. Not the seller, but his down the street neighbor. It fits. Just. 

This is GRM so:

The truck had no trouble at all with the heavy van, trailer and mountains. That thing is a beast!

We made it back to the GoLucky center for defective vans after dark and with only slight difficulty got it off the trailer and into the street. A quick pull up the hill from the trailer to the rear axle and then a gravity assisted run down into the driveway and now here she is in all her glory:

Whew! Big day. Time for bed. 

So, I have had some pretty clapped out vehicles and this one is near the front of the pack. 
Driver door open stop busted. Also visible: hood release lever gone. It will pop if you pull the cable end.

As mentioned previously the interior is GROSS

Rear barn doors don't catch the lower latch. 

Busted door panels.

some extra puncture holes to the outside 

spare MIA  Parking brake dragged pretty hard too. 
missing trim and some dents. Slider door feels bad and sits low of body lines rollers suspect. 

What? Why have this in the cab and NOT clean anything?

Daaaang! This van was doing deliveries since 2020 on at least one of these routes and those are big distances! 

Haha! Found proof they put gas in it. 

What's for lunch? Yuck

scored a bag of rubber bands 

Both headlights are busted

Doesnt seem to be a drop of coolant in the reservoir. 

Tires all suck. Passenger front won't hold air. 
 

No where to go but up from here. 

Ooph.  That thing has led a hard life!

I guess it missed being able to go to its 400,000 mile service , Amazing

In reply to californiamilleghia :

There's no way it has its original cams and rockers.

Today I moved the PromASSter over to make space for some exhaust work on the NV. The guy who parked it didn't get far enough over and it obviously isn't driveable. So...

The flat front passenger tire I put up onto a HF wheel dolly and Egyptian pyramid builder levered it over. 

Also noticed this wire, connected to air. That might need to be sorted out at some point.

After some sweating in the lovely sunshine. The front was where it needed to be. Previously I said something like "all the tires suck" That's not %100 accurate. The fronts are shot. The rears are both serviceable tires and not too old. But they are not a pair. Hopefully one will end up as a spare.

Passenger side

Drivers side:

I used the same technique on the rear of the van. It made the dolly unhappy.

The front one I noticed is pretty hammered too

Hmmm. I wonder if the van is more than this many KG or because of the slush and ice. Either way, they are cheap HF pieces so not a huge deal. 

With the move done I pulled the NV into the driveway. Real side by side comparison. 

No more love to give the Promaster today. On to things closer to done. 

I'm not sure what I was expecting for a $900 promaster, but that feels just about right.  I know our HVAC contractors beat the ever loving snot out of their vans, so this isn't entirely surprising. 

After getting the NV all prettied up I tackled the first stage Promaster clean. Started by throwing away a bunch of garbage. There were some good scores in there too. 

Need a FMV on unopened pack of Cowboy Killers.

Next I vacuumed all the loose ash, butts and grit out. First pass. 

Started scrubbing with the driver door. There was an unbelievable amount of "Hand tar" I scrubbed until my hand didn't stick to it. Went across the front and then over to passenger side. 

First scrub after picture.

Still not great, but it is already way better. This struck me as funny. Even if the partition was added after the fact this van rolled out with no back windows. Did Dodge put this in so you can check your makeup while driving?

These pics are no indication of the work that went into this. My fingers are still sore as I type. Think that I will order up one of those chlorine bomb kits to hopefully get it back near smelling pleasant. It is a start.

Home Depot has extra strength febreze which may help with the odor

IIRC the backup camera is built in to the rearview mirror, so you need the mirror no matter what rear doors it has.

These Promasters had the first backup cameras that I found really useful, as they are mounted high up and are pointed down.  Perfect if you are backing the van up to a load, or a loading dock.

The only Dodge parts of the vehicle are the engine and transmission, the rest is all Fiat.  Remember this and everything will make sense.

Do your lungs a favor and order a cheap Ozone machine from Amazon.  You'll still need to scrub the heck out of everything, but after that's done it will really kill some of the odors.

I'd be shocked if the original engine and trans made it to almost 400K miles.  I'm a bigger fan of that drive train than most, but I am realistic.   It will be interesting to see what you find when you can dig into it.  I'm guess that will be when the weather warms up a bit?  Or are you going to clean it up and make sure it's worth the effort and expense of replacing the engine/drive train?

In reply to Ian F (Forum Supporter) :

I go back to my real job mid March so I'm planning to get cracking on an engine replacement straight away. Junkyard is going to sort through their offerings and reach out with a price list this week. 

I'm undecided as to what role this van will play. Maybe I will keep it to replace my 96 B3500, The big and tall Promaster cargo area is nice. It might also be a flip. If I can keep the cash investment low I think it will be profitable. Van-lifers and tradesmen (tradespersons?) are hyped on these and the cheap end of the market seems sparse. 

Right now I am trying to get it in a state where I can get in the cab without activating a gag reflex. Hahaha. I'm cleaning for myself and any potential future owner. 

Did you run a CarFax on it yet ?

For a couple bucks that might be interesting ,

Check ESTY fot the cheap CarFax

In reply to GoLucky :

I'm amazed that people seek these.  From my experience on the wrench side of things, they're really expensive to keep on the road because a lot of parts are sold through Dodge via Fiat so a lot of fingers want to take a bite, so to speak.  And Fiat loves to do inventory control by only selling things as very expensive assemblies.   My favorite examples being the sway bar links only available as a sway bar assembly... that you have to remove a link from to install.

On the other hand, the people with Promasters always fix them no matter the expense, so they must have something amazing going for them.

Today instead of ordering a chlorine treatment or buying an ozone machine I called my local rental place. They have three. I got one for 24 hours and still have $9.xx left on the credit they gave me for building a replacement part for their sewer auger when I last rented it. 

The magic black box did its thing all day and while I was working on the van I'd occasionally get a whiff of the ozone. Thinking about hooking up a battery charger tomorrow and running the hvac on recirculation for a while before I give it back. Fingers crossed it makes a difference. 

Took out the cabin air filter. Wasn't actually too horrible.

Mostly pulled so that I could jam a beach towel in there to keep the ozone in the cab more.

Started taking things apart. The grill came off when I cut a couple of zip ties. 

There is a missing captive nut on pass side of the middle bumper cover..

Mostly straightforward disassembly, including cutting a number of attatchment zip ties. 

About this time it became more convenient for the van to be on jackstands so I made that happen.

Working on this is a completely different experience than the NV. The engine is right there and even on jackstands it is fairly low. This is also "Euro-Ameri-Metric" where the size of socket just bigger than 10mm is 13mm. Speaking of sockets, I scored another recoup:

This little gem was in the oilmudsludge on the oil cooler lines. 

Mostly everything is pretty clear as to how it comes undone. I kept at taking off thing that I know have to make way. I thought it was cool how the hood release cable easily comes undone. 

More and more apart.

The rubber intake hose is bad and has obstructive tape repair. 

Serpentine belt should also be changed. Not fresh. 

With the A/C compressor off the engine and on the floor (Euro for ground) the whole mess can stay intact and get out of the way. Condenser is sort of caved in, wondering if there is any Freon in the system, will check at some point.

The alternator positive cable is interesting in that it has a tab to also connect to the starter. Cool. Kind of routed behind and through a bunch of things. Alt end. 

Just the other side of the front cat. Heat shielded wire low in the picture. 

It was odd to find Asia-metric 12mm socket fasteners on the front exhaust flange. Probably not OEM. Definitely both broken now.

The rear flange used the expected 13mm and those broke too and I got a pretty decent fingernail smash out of one of them. The other painful part of my day was the upper intake manifold. There are 7 bolts that attatch it to the lower and 5 were so nice and easy to remove. Bolt 6 had the socket spin around it. I hammered a 12pt 7mm on and that got it loose. Bolt 7... This one was a real expletive-mother-explative. It clearly had been marinading in a bath of dirty water for some time. No love at all from any socket. The heads also have a T20 torx in the midde but that too was corroded to the point of uselessness. In this picture it looks like it is maybe there, but after a long time trying and failing to get it to work I escalated. 

First I cleaned out the area more with water from my mouth delivered by a scrap of fuel hose. Ordinarily I'd probably hit it with compressed air, but I have yet to replace my broken air hose. 

This is what I had to work with.

Yuck. Right? The former Torx center was enough to get a drill bit started. Not straight off the drill though, the cowl is too close. I used a right angle flex extension that I got for LS header bolts on the vehicle. I was nervous that I might slip the bit off and mess up the plastic intake. So I stopped and checked my progress frequently.  The first bit broke but it had done enough to go up to the next size. 

Used a telescoping magnet to pull out chips a few times. And then. Bam! My flex angle deal got all wrapped up and busted. It's got an extra right angle now. Dang.

But, on the positive side, it got all wrapped up because:

That's right! Bolt got handled. Whew! That was %1000 more work than it should have been. 

This all was going down in 40F and cloudy and just a speck of snow. Still, having worked recently in so much tougher conditions it felt pretty decent. I was moving and mostly not laying on the creeper so I only needed nitrile gloves all day. Carried my card table of tools into the garage.

Put Promaster parts into its cargo area and left it for the day like this:

Not as far along as I maybe thought, but the extra fight in the manifold bolts definitely hampered productivity. 

In reply to Ian F (Forum Supporter) :

I don't know? This van had 55k on it in 2024 according to the title. No mention of engine replacement from the seller, but he mostly just mumbled and smoked cigs. Wonder if I can check the engine serial #?

In reply to Pete. (l33t FS) :

I don't know if/how they're good; I've never actually driven one even. Hahaha. I did see a replacement grill on RockAuto for $760 That seems about right, right?!?!