67 Dart 270...Project Old School

[sledger46]

I hammered the tight spots and loaded my 3200 stall, 904 converter onto the front of the A500. It took quite a while to get the trans and engine to come together, but I got it done. The A500 is now hanging off the back of the 360 and tonight I will start building the cross member.

I will contact the driveshaft shop and ask them how they want me to measure for the new shaft length.

 

[sledger46]

Last night I measured for the new driveshaft. I will take my existing one and have it cut down and swap out the 904 spline yoke for a 727 spline yoke. The measurements the shop wanted were from the yoke on the rear end to the end of the transmission case where the seal mounts. Then they wanted a measurement to the end of the seal and also a measurement to the end of the output shaft.

From the yoke on the rearend:
49 1/8" to the end of the transmission case where the seal mounts.
48" to the end of the seal.
47 7/8" to the end of the output shaft on the transmission.


I will drop off the driveshaft to be shortened today at lunch and hopefully have it back before the weekend.

 

[sledger46]

I picked up the driveshaft at lunch on Friday. I mounted it into the car that afternoon and the fit looks good.

The rest of the weekend was spent hacking up the cross member trying to come up with a starting point to build the new cross member to fit the A500. The problem is after all the hacking the cross member was so flimsy it was hardly worth using. I am working on a new design based on tubular steel. Hopefully it will be plenty strong without all the weight. I will post up pictures, if it turns out to be successful.

 

[sledger46]

I finally completed the cross member and got it installed. Why no pictures...well lets just say it is ugly and unorthodox. I want to get some miles on it to prove it's worth before I start showing pictures of how it is made. I did have to make a 1/4" aluminum spacer to get the driveline angle back to where I started.

I had to extend the wires on my electric speed sensor. No speedo cable as my Dart has a digital dash. I managed to get the kick down cable, shifter cable, and transmission cooler lines hooked back up. I am 4 torque converter bolts and starter installed away from firing up the car and testing the new trans on jack stands.

I need to get some miles on the new combo before I even think of heading out on Power Tour.

 

[sledger46]

As the June 5th date looms in the near future I am hustling to get as much done as possible before I leave for Power Tour. The wiring is pretty much done. The speed sensor for the digital speedometer has been wired. I now have a simple ON/OFF switch wired for the OD. I have the heater controls blank plate fabbed and the stereo back in the dash. The sub is wired up in the trunk and I love the way it rounds out the sound of the stereo.

I need to verify the bolts for the driveshaft are tight and then I need to tighten the torsion bars so I can get the car on the ground. I almost forgot a driver's seat, so I can test drive and verify the OD is working.

I am going to skip wiring up and installing the heater box (for now). I got my .023 feed roller and tips for my welder so I can finish the work to fill all the firewall holes. I need to get the sound deadener installed and get the carpet back into the car. I need to reinstall the door handles and key locks in the doors and trunk. I need to dye the door panels and get the interior door handles installed.

 

[sledger46]

The Dart is off jack stands and actually made it around the block without tearing out the torsion bar cross member. Of course it is raining so once around the block is as far as she went. I did feel the trans shift into second gear. Hopefully the rains will subside long enough to get out on the highway and test the OD.

 

[sledger46]

In between all the rain showers I managed to get the Dart out onto the highway for some testing of the OD. Cruising at 60 MPH showed 3200 RPM on the tach. Switching on OD results in a drop to 2500 RPM and the car wants to keep accelerating. Switching off OD results in....eh...nothing. The car seems to be stuck in OD until you come to a stop and the car shifts down to 1st gear.

I think I screwed up with wiring the switch on the 12V side instead of the GND side of the circuit. I will have to swap the wiring and see if the situation improves. Hopefully, that will resolve the situation.

On another note I think I have the perfect test candidate to quantify exactly how much HP/ET you give up going to the A500. I am seeing claims of reducing your ET 1- 1.5 seconds swapping from an A500 to a 904. The claim is the OD is constantly turning which robs HP when accelerating. Since I had my A500 converted to non lockup, I am using the same converter as I did in front of my 904. The only real change is the transmission.

I got my .023 drive roller for my Hobart MIG welder so I was able to weld up all the holes in the firewall. I can't believe how many holes there are. Trying to get the firewall smoothed out is going be a lot of work grinding down welds and skimming body filler.

 

[sledger46]

Trouble in Sledgoville.... The A500 will go into OD, but it won't come out until you shut off the car. Seems like there is some valve body incompatibility. Grrr.....

 

[Abodybomber]

Congratulations, on driving it. Just be patient, on the small sh*t. It drives everyone looney,once in a while.

 

[sledger46]

I took my Dart back to the shop that built my A500 transmission and they swapped in a non-lockup A518 valve body. They only had to ream out one hole in the A518 valve body for it to bolt into the A500. The overdrive now works correctly and turns off and on with the switch. The guys at the shop spent some extra time with me going on test drives to get the shift timing and feel to my liking. At this point I am a happy camper!

I will miss the first part of the Hot Rod Power tour at Madison Wisconsin, but I should be at the Champaign, IL stop. Champaign is my old stomping grounds back in the 80s and 90s. I will be at the Gateway stop as I live right outside St Louis. Hopefully I can make a few passes at the track and get some hard data to compare 904 versus A500. I keep hearing the A500 is 1-1.5 seconds slower then the 904. Mine should be a good test as the only thing that has changed is the transmission. Even the converter is the same for the A500 as the 904 since I converted to non-lockup.

 

[sledger46]

I ended up missing the Champaign stop for Power Tour....sort of... I have a good friend in Champaign who was packing up his house in preparations for a move to a new home. I ended up driving my truck over with my two sons and helped him pack up his house. We did take some time to head over to Parkland college and check out the Power Tour cars rolling into town.

I did make it to the stop at Gateway Motorsports Park since it was in my backyard. I got to walk around and check out the myriad of cars, trucks, and some,....well they were hard to describe.

This was the Dart parked on the oval in between two very nice cars. It is funny how small the Dart looks in that photo.

They were offering free "Fun Runs" on the drag strip, so I headed over to take advantage of that. The weather was hot and muggy.

I did manage to get three passes in, but discovered the shifter was off by one detent. It took me two passes to figure it out. First pass the tach bounced of 6700 before I let completely out of it. I had to hit the shifter a second time for second gear to engage. The second pass the tach hit 6300 before I got out of it and hit the shifter a second time to engage second gear. The third time I shifted into second on the shifter before I staged. It turns out all the detents were off one position which makes me wonder how I ever found PARK. I will have to spend some time re-indexing the shifter to make sure it is correct.

I will have to get the shifter sorted out before I can really compare the A500 performance versus the A904 performance. Let's just say in either case I would be no match for the Challenger Hellcats turning 11.00s at 125+ MPH.

 

[SpeedracerX]

very cool

 

[sledger46]

I have been fighting with my Hurst Promatic II and based off the "internet" stories, most people give up. It took a week of constant tinkering, but I think I have the shifter lined out. I am thinking the tight tunnel confines from the physically larger A500 has the shifter cable turning tighter and adding more drag on the cable. My solution was upping the spring pressure in the shifter mechanism to insure I got complete motion from the ratchet action.

Since my shifter hasn't been right it is hard to provide conclusive data on the power loss from the A500. The only data I have is from an 1/8mi track (Bonne Terre) that I have only been to two times. The time I went with the 904 it was cooler and the car ran a best of 8.29. Running in the July heat with a shifter that wasn't right I ran a best of 8.45.

I also need to get the car reweighed in it's current configuration. I am hearing the A500 weighs 70 lbs more, but I think that includes the heavy lockup converter, which I did not use. I added the trans weight, Small 8" sub box, acoustical mat, door panels and door latch hardware. I removed the AC/Heater box and have the console out of the car. I am thinking from a weight stand point that the Dart is about he same as before.

 

[KevinB]

Looking great! Maybe I missed it, but what are your impressions of the flaming river box? Worth the price? How many turns of the wheel now?

 

[6-david-5]

I finally completed the cross member and got it installed. Why no pictures...well lets just say it is ugly and unorthodox. I want to get some miles on it to prove it's worth before I start showing pictures of how it is made. I did have to make a 1/4" aluminum spacer to get the driveline angle back to where I started.

To begin, I want to thank you for ALL of the photography and documentation/blogging. I realize how much time it adds to your already-monumental efforts! Happy that I subscribed.

However, I really would like to see your transmission crossmember. I can tell how self-conscious you are about it, but please be mindful of the additional information you will be giving to this community of us that opt for that overdrive gear from a Chrysler-based trans that will bolt right to the back of our small-blocks. I have a '92 A518 that I want to install into my '65 Valiant, and I'm trying to keep myself talked into installing it when the time comes!

Best

 

[sledger46]

Looking great! Maybe I missed it, but what are your impressions of the flaming river box? Worth the price? How many turns of the wheel now?

I like the flaming river box. I ended up with 3 turns lock to lock. Since I started with manual steering the swap from the original steering box to the Flaming River box was straight forward. I love the feel of the "tight" box out on the highway. I really didn't notice much change in effort turning with the car standing still, but I am still rocking the stock (bus sized) steering wheel.

Two small things to consider is the increased weight from the iron box and some slight header interference from the thicker casting on one tube.

Best price I found was at Speedway Motors, but I am sure Summit Racing or Jegs would be willing to price match.

 

[sledger46]

I really would like to see your transmission crossmember.

I will jack up the car tonight and get some photos. The cross member I built actually bolts to the back of torsion bar sub frame using the original holes and longer bolts. This places the actual mount under the transmission in the correct location. The factory cross member places the mount too far forward and has to be extended rearward to reach the mount on the A500/A518. This will give you a rough idea:

This top perspective does not give you the angle of the tubes going down to meet the mount. If I did it again I would have sprung for a tubing bender and had the tubing run under the mount, so it was continuous side to side. I would have spread the tubing apart so the bolts into the rubber mount would fit between the tubes.

 

[sledger46]

I built my transmission cross member out of 1/2" mild steel tubing and some 1/8" x 1/2" mild steel flat bought from Lowe's. For the actual mount location I used some rectangular tubing I cut out of the main support of a Harbor freight engine stand to shorten it so it would fit under the work bench with a short block attached.

Here is the tubing:

Here you can see the flat steel welded in place:

This makes for a very stiff unit.

Here is a shot showing the tube welded on the end and bolted to the torsion bar frame:

I took the rectangular tubing piece and cut out one long side to get a U shape with the long side on the bottom of the U. I then bent down the two short sides to get the angle I needed to meet with the tubing arms. I drilled the two holes and bolted this to the rubber mount already bolted to the transmission. I actually made the two side arms and hung them then swung them around to meet the plate and tacked it in place while under the car. I unbolted it all and welded it on the bench.

This is a dark picture of the center mount portion bolted to the transmission:

So far the cross member has survived 10 passes at the track and about 400 road miles.

I tried to lighten the above photo:

 

[sledger46]

I finally got back to the track with a working shifter to get some comparative data between the A500 and the 904 that it replaced. The A500 was setup non lockup and the same Edge Racing 9.5" torque converter was used with both transmissions. The engine tune was the same (timing, carb jetting), same 3.91 gear ratio, same Riken Raptors 255x17 tires on the back.

NEW INFORMATION:
904 Dry weight 103 lbs
A500 Dry weight 147 lbs

Changes to the car included swapping in the A500 itself (+ 44 lbs) adding a sub box in the trunk (+25 lbs) removing the AC/Heater box from under the dash (- 35 lbs) and removing the console (-20 lbs) which results in a total additional weight of 14 lbs. The 14 lbs is would only result in a .014 second penalty and .14 MPH penalty. Hardly worth noting in this case.

2014 - 904..........2015 - A500
...............1st Pass
60ft 1.867.............60ft 1.887
330ft 5.390..........330ft 5.518
660ft 8.348..........660ft 8.568
MPH 82.99............MPH 80.32
1000 10.915........1000 11.228
1/4 13.093.............1/4 13.493
MPH 103.55..........MPH 99.51

...............2nd Pass
60ft 1.878.............60ft 1.861
330ft 5.368..........330ft 5.461
660ft 8.309..........660ft 8.494
MPH 83.40...........MPH 80.69
1000 10.860........1000 11.140
1/4 13.024............1/4 13.394
MPH 104.35..........MPH 99.82

................3rd Pass
60ft 1.880.............60ft 1.861
330ft 5.369..........330ft 5.466
660ft 8.306..........660ft 8.500
MPH 83.57...........MPH 80.61
1000 10.854.......1000 11.145
1/4 13.016...........1/4 13.398
MPH 104.42.........MPH 100.00


...............4th Pass
60ft 1.887**..............60ft 1.846
330ft 5.342**...........330ft 5.440
660ft 8.252**...........660ft 8.472
MPH 84.33**............MPH 80.68
1000 10.775**........1000 11.117
1/4 12.913**.............1/4 13.367
MPH 105.61**..........MPH 100.17

** in 2014 I removed 100 LBS before the last pass by emptying the trunk.

Just looking at the numbers above and focusing on the first 3 passes, it looks like the additional power to turn the A500 cost me about .40 seconds and 4.0 MPH in the 1/4 mile even after you factor out the weight change. I guess it just bugs me more because it pushed my car out of the 12s and back into the 13s.

 

[sledger46]

As the temperature start getting colder I am reminded I never finished the install of my new heater box. I got the heater box from Summit Racing and had previously fabbed up some tubes to mount the box. Having the retractable tubes has two advantages: 1) easy installation where you slide the small tubes in and then set the unit so the bolts go through the firewall and then angle it up into position and slide the smaller tubs out to rest on the inside shelf of the dash. 2) in a bad accident the tubes can collapse and prevent spearing the passenger.

The big end has a bolt with the head welded inside the tube. The bolts go through the firewall and are retained by a washer and nut. As it turned out, one bolt came through the firewall behind the distributor and the other came through just inside the wheel housing. One of the things I needed to do was paint the raw metal. I ended up painting it with a dark hammer tone paint.

OK, the paint is dry and now I need to figure out how to direct the ducts on the heater box to the right places. My Dart has two defroster vents in the dash that I wanted to have connected to the heater box. The factory tubing is too small to connect to the opening on the heater box. The solution was to pick up some reducer, 90 degree, elbows to connect the factory tubing to the heater box. http://intakehoses.com/ I also picked up a non-reducer, 90 degree elbow to direct the third vent down at the passengers feet. (my wife always complains her feet are cold.)

The factory tubing fit tightly inside the smaller end of the reducer elbows. I had to do some trimming to the elbows to reduce their length to get a nice fit under the dash.

I had to use heater hose inside the car to connect the heater box to the custom bulkhead fittings I bought from a hotrod shop. Once the heater box was mounted inside the car, I laid out the hose routing under the hood. I am not a big fan of heater hoses running all over under the hood. The placement of the bulkhead fitting gave me a pretty straight shot just inside the passenger valve cover.

Now it was time to hook the hoses up and check for leaks.

I didn't find any leaks, so now all I have left is the wiring.

 

[sledger46]

I am in the process of tearing down a 360 Magnum engine I pulled out of a 2002 Dodge truck. The engine has 240K + miles on it, but internally looks pretty good. The plan is to re-ring and re-bearing the engine after some flex hone action in the cylinders. I then plan to move over the 2.02/1.62 EQ heads and roller cam from my tired LA 360. The overall goal is to gain enough HP to push the A500 equiped 67 Dart back into the 12s.

Why go with the Magnum over the LA?

The pistons in the LA are .088" in the hole at TDC. The pistons in the Magnum are only .054" in the hole. That, right there will boost my compression almost 1/2 a point. The ring package on the Magnum provides better sealing and reduced friction.

So, how am I planning to get back the 40 HP the A500 stole?
1/2 point increase in compression
STD volume oil pump versus the high volume pump in the LA
Add a windage tray
Port match the LA intake and EQ Magnum heads
Port match the headers and exhaust ports on the heads
Block off the coolant passages in the intake that run under the carb

On to the tear down...

This is what the pistons look like after eating up the competition...

The usual slack in the timing chain after 240K+ miles...

 

[03JeepJeep]

Magnum for the win!!!!!!

 

[6-david-5]

This sounds like a great time to swap cams in the Magnum, but it doesn't sound like it's in your plan (?).

I really hope you reach your track goal--you certainly deserve it after all that work with the trans swap! And I'm watching to see what it takes to get past the horsepower sponge that the RH transmissions are known for. I've read about figures of "up to 1 sec in the 1/4" on Dakota forums (a5eighteen), but your accounts of this seem more realistic--but still made me pause!

If something's costing horsepower, build more motor! That's cool with me!

 

[sledger46]

Actually this is my second attempt to get a Magnum under the hood. The last one was a fail due to water/coolant/gunk I found in a cylinder that had eaten up part of the cylinder wall. It was suppose to be a 40K mile crate motor that got pulled in favor of a big block. Before I tore off the cylinder heads I had ordered a custom Competition Cams roller cam on the LA blank. When the Magnum went bust I ordered up some retrofit roller lifters and put the cam in the LA 360. It has 224/230 degrees duration at .050" on 110 LSA with .513" lift.

 

[Abodybomber]

Big fan of the Magnum,myself... That cam,should be spot,specwise.Nice work.