Engine sensor failure on the 2003 Dodge RAM 1500
Only 6 reports for this mode came with an odometer reading, which is too few for percentiles to mean anything. The page is here because someone linked to it; treat the figures as anecdotes, and see the full report for this year instead.
When engine sensor failure gets reported
There are 6 reports of engine sensor failure on the 2003 Dodge RAM 1500, 6 with a mileage attached. That is too few to place the failure on the odometer with any confidence.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 95,000 miles. It is the 30th most-reported problem on this model year.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| — | — | 129,000 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
Putting it right typically runs $180–$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 3 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2007, at a median of 35,000 miles, and latest on the 2003 at 130,000 miles.
By volume the 2003 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.
This 2003 dodge was purchase and had started having problems right away there are tie rod links in the front end that snap and in arizona we can not find anyone that sells replacement parts to fix it. Or parts that fit this year and make truck. We have had to get some one to fabricate them for us.the computer box started failing and also an oxygen sensor that fails and causes the truck to randomly shut off you lose all your steering you have to throw the truck in neutral and restart and throw it into drive to get your steering back. After we replaced the computer the rear end of the truck locked up at 65 miles an hour thank god the seat belt are the only thing in this vehicle that are working and thank god we were not going any faster and some one other than me was driving because things could have ended very badly. In the process of trying to fix the rear end we could only find two rear ends in the state of arizona that sold for 1600.00 dollars with over 90,000 miles on them the rest were completely mangled with the same problem. The more part service people I have talked to all said this is a very common problem with this…
The truck has a issue when starting up. It feels like the truck is not getting fuel, giving a high RPM and a feel like the engine is going to cut off and it does. This also happens when taking off at a stop light, going around a curve, and starting to move the truck. I have been to dealer and like always, can't find wrong in truck. I have replaced crank,map,air,speed,tps and nothing works. I also replaced o2 sensor,plugs, coil packs, battery, air filter, replaced throttle body, and purge. Nothing works. Why doesn't dodge see there is a issue and find a solution. There are many dodge rams with this issue. If dodge wants people to buy there truck then help fix the issues with the other dodge ram's. Oh I also called dodge corp and of course they haven't heard of any issue. That I can't go by!!! *tr
The truck has a issue when starting up. It feels like the truck is not getting fuel, giving a high RPM and a feel like the engine is going to cut off and it does. This also happens when taking off at a stop light, going around a curve, and starting to move the truck. I have been to dealer and like always, can't find wrong in truck. I have replaced crank,map,air,speed,tps and nothing works. I also replaced o2 sensor,plugs, coil packs, battery, air filter, replaced throttle body, and purge. Nothing works. Why doesn't dodge see there is a issue and find a solution. There are many dodge rams with this issue. If dodge wants people to buy there truck then help fix the issues with the other dodge ram's. Oh I also called dodge corp and of course they haven't heard of any issue. That I can't go by!!! *tr
Also reported on the 2003 Dodge RAM 1500
Other body or interior problem
Airbag inflator rupture
CV axle or driveshaft failure
Other engine problem
Premature brake pad or rotor wear
Other powertrain problem
How far this goes
This page is kept out of search results because 6 reports is not enough to publish percentiles from. It stays reachable because somebody looking at this exact car would rather see the reports than be told there are none.
Complaints are voluntary, so 6 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 engine sensor failure happen on the 2003 Dodge RAM 1500?
Across 6 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 130,000 miles. A quarter were filed before — and a quarter after —. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is engine sensor failure on the 2003 Dodge RAM 1500?
6 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.0 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