The good news for Trenton Engine and Ram/Jeep buyers

Two pieces of good news came out of Trenton Engine recently, even as Stellantis temporarily closed the plant due to an oversupply of V6 engines. Industry insiders noted that running a plant seven days a week at full tilt, only to close it because of overproduction, is not unusual—it’s been industry practice across many automakers even when American Motors was still around.

First, Trenton has already started building advanced “PUG” (Pentastar Upgrade) V6 engines for the 2025 Ram 1500. This is a more efficient version of the original Pentastar; it costs more but provides more flexibility in valve timing and lift, cooled EGR, and other features which increase power and fuel economy.

Second, the plant is scheduled to add a new PUG V6 for the updated Jeep Grand Cherokee in October. These updates are noticeably coming to Trenton rather than to the Mexican plant which also makes V6 engines.

While the company has consolidated engine production to just one of the two buildings in the Trenton complex, it is quite a large building with a high capacity, and adding these two variants suggests that the complex and the Pentastar V6 itself has some runtime left over the next few years.

Stellantis did not have any comments for this report.