Radiator or coolant leak on the 2007 Dodge Charger
3 fires 3 of the 40 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.
When radiator or coolant leak gets reported
Owners of the 2007 Dodge Charger report radiator or coolant leak at a median of 110,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 90,000 miles and a quarter after 127,500 miles, from 35 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 98,000 miles. It is the 4th most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 70,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 140,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 69,218 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
A spread this wide points at use rather than design. Towing, climate, service history and city mileage all move a failure like this, so the median is a weak guide to any individual car.
3% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 70,382 miles | 89,000 miles | 111,000 miles | 127,000 miles | 139,600 miles |
Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.
What a percentile can and cannot tell you here
These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.
What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.
Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.
What happens, and what it costs
Of these reports, 3 a fire is mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.
Putting it right typically runs $350–$1,900 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 7 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2011, at a median of 35,000 miles, and latest on the 2007 at 110,000 miles.
By volume the 2007 is the worst of them, which makes this a problem of this specific year rather than of the model as a whole.
If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.
Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens
What owners wrote
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.
High speed radiator fan blades on 2007 3.5l dodge charger break apart and causes damage to the radiator, resulting in failure of the radiator and subsequent replacement of both radiator and the radiator fan. Consequential repair exceeds $700. *tr
My vehicles engine light was on while I was taking it to get inspected. Aaa ran a test to find out as to why the engine light was on. The diagnostics should a problem with the plenum, air intake valve and the car needed a reflash or update in the cars computer. I took the vehicle down to a dodge dealership and found out that the plenum is a common fail part and is a dealer only part and cost 969.00 to replace. After having the reflash done on my vehicle and finding out about the plenum I returned to aaa to find out if they could fix the problem cheaper. They then checked the recall list to see if their were any recalls. The recalls for my vehicle were for the cars computer system , the interlock mechanism for the clutch, and the radiator fan. After finding out about the reflash being on recall I called the dealership in an attempt to get my money back and was told recalls are VIN specific, even though distributed by regular mechanics. After fixing the engine light problem and getting my car inspected, 3 days later the interlock mechanism broke and would not allow me to move the clutch to put car in gear. I took it to the…
My vehicles engine light was on while I was taking it to get inspected. Aaa ran a test to find out as to why the engine light was on. The diagnostics should a problem with the plenum, air intake valve and the car needed a reflash or update in the cars computer. I took the vehicle down to a dodge dealership and found out that the plenum is a common fail part and is a dealer only part and cost 969.00 to replace. After having the reflash done on my vehicle and finding out about the plenum I returned to aaa to find out if they could fix the problem cheaper. They then checked the recall list to see if their were any recalls. The recalls for my vehicle were for the cars computer system , the interlock mechanism for the clutch, and the radiator fan. After finding out about the reflash being on recall I called the dealership in an attempt to get my money back and was told recalls are VIN specific, even though distributed by regular mechanics. After fixing the engine light problem and getting my car inspected, 3 days later the interlock mechanism broke and would not allow me to move the clutch to put car in gear. I took it to the…
Also reported on the 2007 Dodge Charger
Other powertrain problem
Shifter, linkage or stuck-in-park failure
Other engine problem
Airbag inflator rupture
Other electrical problem
Other brake problem
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 40 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.
Questions this page answers
At what mileage does radiator or coolant leak happen on the 2007 Dodge Charger?
Across 35 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 110,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 90,000 miles and a quarter after 127,500 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is radiator or coolant leak on the 2007 Dodge Charger?
40 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.6 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.
What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars
Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed