AS SEEN IN OUR DIESEL WORLD SEPTEMBER 2026 ISSUE – Buy Now!

Every Lane—No Compromises

Dalton Finck built his Ram to do everything and then actually uses it that way. It’s been 6.33, laid down 1,700+ horsepower, hooked to a sled, and still sees regular street miles. Same setup, no switching roles, just a truck that shows up and works. Full feature live now. #Cummins #5SecondTruck #DieselPerformance #StreetTruck #BuiltNotBought #TREPerformance #MeltingPistons #FluxDiesel #VSRacing #DieselLife

At a glance, Dalton Finck’s 2006 Ram looks like a clean, simple work truck—right up until it leaves the line. It fits him better than he’d probably admit, quiet at first, a little rough around the edges in the right places, and far more capable than it lets on. Dalton’s the kind of North Carolina guy who looks more at home in work boots and dirty jeans than standing next to a dyno sheet, but that’s part of what makes the truck work. It doesn’t need a loud owner. The truck handles that.

The story started with a late-night Facebook Marketplace find and a 16-hour round trip to South Carolina. Dalton brought home a white 2006 Dodge 2500 with a G56 manual, a straight pipe, a dual-disc clutch, a small tune, and 145,000 miles on the odometer. It wasn’t some half-finished project. It was a mostly stock truck that had been driven by an older woman through the hills of Greenville, which is about as far from a “future sled puller and drag truck” as it gets.

For a while, Dalton just drove it. He put 35s on the stock wheels, handled normal maintenance, and used it like a truck. Around 180,000 miles, the stock injectors started to show signs of wear, and that opened the door for what would quickly become one of the best builds we’ve seen in a long time. A deal on a drop-in turbo turned into Flux Diesel Injection 26-percent overs, valve springs, pushrods, head studs, a FASS fuel system, and EFI Live tuning. The first drive after that changed the way Dalton looked at the truck. It wasn’t just transportation anymore; the truck had the potential to be something more, and Dalton aimed to find that.

The goal became a do-it-all build—drag racing, sled pulling, dirt drags, dyno hits, and street driving, all with the same truck. Dalton didn’t want something that only worked in one lane. His thinking was simple: if you’re going to spend that much time and money on a truck, you should still be able to drive it to the gas station or get groceries. King of the Street helped lock that idea in place. From there, he started saving money, selling what he could, and buying parts one piece at a time.

The build took a turn when Dalton found a brand-new D&J Performance Series 6.7 still sitting in a crate. He’d originally planned to run an S467 over S480 compound setup on the stock engine with more fuel, but the D&J engine changed the plan. Once that motor showed up, the truck went into the shop, and Dalton started tearing it down himself. A few months later, it was running again with the new engine, compounds, Flux 300s, a 14 mm S&S high-speed CP3, and a FASS 290.

At that point, the truck still had the G56 manual transmission. Dalton knew an automatic would be quicker and more consistent, but he wanted to see how far he could push the manual. The answer came pretty fast once the truck hit the dragstrip. The G56 was fun on the street, but it wasn’t happy doing race truck things. That setback led him to Trent Owens, Tim Barber, TRE Performance Transmissions, and Melting Pistons Race Parts.

The swap to a full competition 48RE changed the truck. The transmission uses a Santjer 37-spline solid input shaft, billet shafts, a DPC triple-disc converter, and a Muldoon’s full manual valve body, with TRE’s work inside tying it all together. That move gave Dalton the consistency he needed to compete harder without fighting the truck every pass. The manual had personality, but the automatic made the truck more useful where it mattered.

The current setup moved away from compounds and into a single VSRacing GT55 88 mm mounted to custom piping by Nathan Williams. The wastegate routing through the carbon fiber demon-style hood has become one of Dalton’s favorite parts of the truck, and it gives the white Ram just enough attitude without burying it in unnecessary drama. Fuel still comes from the Flux 300s, the 14 mm S&S pump, and the FASS 290, with the D&J 6.7 carrying the load underneath it all.

The chassis is built for the same wide range of abuse. It has Viking dual-adjustable rear shocks with Firepunk mounts, factory leaf springs minus two leaves on each side, Longhorn Fab traction bars, Yukon chromoly shafts, DNR driveshafts, front and rear hoops, and Mickey Thompson ET Street Rs on custom Centerline wheels. It’s not set up for one perfect pass on one perfect surface. It’s set up to be used over and over again.

The numbers make the point without needing much dressing up. The truck has been 6.33 in the eighth and has put down 1,734 horsepower and 2,486 lb-ft of torque on the dyno. It has also seen Diesel Truck Wars, Rudy’s Spring Truck Jam, King of the Streets, dirt drags, sled pulls, dyno events, car shows, and plenty of street miles. That’s the part that matters here. Dalton didn’t build a truck that changes identity depending on where it’s parked. He built one truck to do it all, and we love it.

Inside, the Ram is more functional than flashy. Corbeau racing seats sit on Firepunk brackets; an Edge Insight and AutoMeter gauges keep an eye on things, and Dalton added steering wheel buttons for the staging limiter and nitrous. It still has A/C, which feels right for a truck built to be driven instead of just unloaded.

What gives this build its shape is how much of it Dalton did himself. He estimates 99 percent of the work was his, and that lines up with the way he talks about it. He’s not trying to make it sound easy. He’ll tell you it took money, patience, long nights, and plenty of second-guessing. He’ll also tell you the only real regret was not going automatic sooner, which is a very diesel-truck way to learn a lesson.

The payoff came when the truck started making rounds in 6.70 and ET racing. It then went to King of the Street and nearly finished in the top five before a driveshaft failure during sled pulling ended the run. Dalton isn’t treating that like the end of the story. He’s already planning to come back swinging.

The truck still isn’t finished, because project trucks enjoy lying to their owners. Dalton wants to refresh the paint, possibly add an 8.50 cage, and keep refining the setup. Whatever changes come next, the goal stays the same. It’s going to remain a do-it-all truck.

Dalton’s Ram gets used the same way it was built. It drag races, sled pulls, hits the dyno, and still sees street miles, all on the same setup he put together himself, without dialing it back or dressing it up for one job. It does everything it was built to do, and it does it the same way every time.