Front end rebuild 1972 Duster
This car was bought in 2007 as a slant six, 3 speed on the column 4 wheel drum brake “Gold Duster”.
My brother in law wanted to get into the Mopar hobby so we bought this car to fix up.
In 2007-2008 we (mostly me!) did a 360 swap along with a 4 speed and 8 3/4” axle and front disc brakes. I painted it in 2011.
Jeff couldn’t get the hang of driving a manual transmission (millennial) so I swapped in a 904. Eventually he gave up on the car and I bought him out.
Now I’m tasked with addressing some of the short cuts we (I) did back then to get the car moving. For now, I’m working on the mechanical stuff, starting with the front end.
When up in the air, it is toed IN.
On the floor, it is toed out.
The UCA bushings are cracked and long overdue for replacement.
I have some good polyurethane bushings to use…
But to maximize caster, I’m going with the Moog K-7103 offset bushings.
I’ve found that these can make a 2 degree difference in positive caster. I was able to get almost 6 degrees of caster in my Charger with stock UCAs and these offset bushings. I know it sounds impossible but I verified it with different equipment and it came up the same.
Since I’m on the subject of caster, here is something that I found. Some of you may already know but I’ve just now noticed…
The strut rods for A body cars changed sometime in the 70s. The working length changed at the same time that the front section changed from coarse thread to fine thread.
A response in the Q&A section of a Mopar Action magazine covered this. At some point, the strut rods changed from 16 9/16 to 16 3/4”. The rear stayed fine thread.
This car was bought in 2007 as a slant six, 3 speed on the column 4 wheel drum brake “Gold Duster”.
My brother in law wanted to get into the Mopar hobby so we bought this car to fix up.
In 2007-2008 we (mostly me!) did a 360 swap along with a 4 speed and 8 3/4” axle and front disc brakes. I painted it in 2011.
Jeff couldn’t get the hang of driving a manual transmission (millennial) so I swapped in a 904. Eventually he gave up on the car and I bought him out.
Now I’m tasked with addressing some of the short cuts we (I) did back then to get the car moving. For now, I’m working on the mechanical stuff, starting with the front end.
When up in the air, it is toed IN.
On the floor, it is toed out.
The UCA bushings are cracked and long overdue for replacement.
I have some good polyurethane bushings to use…
But to maximize caster, I’m going with the Moog K-7103 offset bushings.
I’ve found that these can make a 2 degree difference in positive caster. I was able to get almost 6 degrees of caster in my Charger with stock UCAs and these offset bushings. I know it sounds impossible but I verified it with different equipment and it came up the same.
Since I’m on the subject of caster, here is something that I found. Some of you may already know but I’ve just now noticed…
The strut rods for A body cars changed sometime in the 70s. The working length changed at the same time that the front section changed from coarse thread to fine thread.
A response in the Q&A section of a Mopar Action magazine covered this. At some point, the strut rods changed from 16 9/16 to 16 3/4”. The rear stayed fine thread.