My Dad bought a '94 Dakota 3.9 5-speed short box standard cab brand new ! He drove it from 0-98,000 miles issue free. Sold it to a local guy and he took it well over 200k with just a new clutch and maybe a couple of minor things. Ran great when he sold it.
I always liked Dakotas, a friend of mine, his son gave me a 89 extended cab, he drove it over to my house, backed it in my driveway, and handed me the title Free.
It has a miss in the 3.9, it was a burnt exhaust valve. Pulled one head, had a valve job done, replaced the steering rack, because it was power one way and manual the other, and put 4 new tires on it. I had around $325 in the whole truck.
It was a nice rust free truck, gave it to my youngest daughter, she put around 80,000 more miles on the truck, before the trans started acting up. She sold it for $900 to some guy that wanted the body to fix his.