here is the actual e-mail i got and below that is the article..
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joe-
dave wallace forwarded your request for data on 'sammy's dart."
i don't recall seeing articles in print and i don't have copies of whatever may have run, but i do have on file a copy of what may have been the first installment that steve collison wrote in that 'series.'.
steve sent it to me for review and comments.
i've copied what i sent back to steve here below for your review. i hope it helps.
an old pal of mine used to work for barton and was tight with steve, so i'll ask him what he recalls about the project next time i contact him.
best of luck with the dodge and i hope you son appreciates your interest and assistance.
have a great holiday season.
al kirschenbaum
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steve-
my suggestions, comments, fixes, additions appear in brackets [] and are usually in all upper case unless what i wrote could be used in your story.
yew needa czech a coupla things with rbre.
grate title, sub, tale.
call if ya need further explanations.
eya
@
Mean Mr. Mopar
Making New World power in an Old World Dodge
By Steve Collison
Photos by the Author
The following is a true story; the names have been changed to protect the innocent.
When Sam Wyatt was as tall as the door handle on his dad's 5.0 Mustang, he promised that someday he'd have his own fast Ford. He maintained that dream through Jr. Dragsters and into high school. Then, on the brink of his 17th birthday, Sam changed his mind. "Dad, I want a Mopar."
Not just any Mopar, but a 1971 Dodge Dart Swinger. Actually it was a fake; the car had been converted in the early 1990s from a stock 318 Dart by a Baby Boomer intent on joining the muscle car revival. He did the right things mechanically: 340 4-bbl engine, 3-speed Torque-Flite trans, 8 3/4-inch Posi [SURE-GRIP, NOT POSI] rear with 3.91 gears. Except for some rust around the rear wheel wells, the body was straight and painted bright yellow with contrasting black vinyl top, twin hood scoops and rear bumble-bee stripe. The interior was black and clean. I liked the car; it had major character, and was not another belly button Mustang or Camaro.
We could care less that the Dart's "numbers" didn't match. We were only interested in a cool car Sam could drive to school and race on weekends, preferably in the 12-second zone. So we bought the Dodge and brought it home where it promptly broke in the driveway.
It didn't take an automotive genius to sense something was seriously wrong when neither the fan belt nor the crank damper were turning while the motor was running. [WOULDN'T THE STATIONARY FAN AND CRANK PULLEYS AND BELT THE FIRST THING'S YOU'D SEE?] I nearly slit my throat signaling Sam to shut the engine off. Mopars are notorious for crank key failure [ I WASN'T AWARE OF A PROBLEM IN THIS AREA OF ANY MOPAR ENGINE? A BARTONISM PERHAPS?], and the best case scenario called for a simple fix. But no, it was worse than that. Once we got the balancer off we found a large chunk of metal missing from its backside. Where did that metal go?
[A MISING PIECE OF METAL FROM THE BACKSIDE OF THE BALANCER WOULD FALL OFF EXTERNALLY AND PROLLY NOT HURT ANY INTERNALS. IF A PIECE BROKE OFF THE BACK OF THE BALANCER'S HUB, THAT COULD GET INSIDE THE MOTOR.]
Resigned to yanking the motor, we weighed our options. We could rebuild the stock engine or drop in a crate motor from Mopar Performance Parts. The latter was tempting, but the Magnum 380 we coveted (380 horses, 360 cubes) was $3500 mail order, had different intake and exhaust [DIFFERENT INTAKE ONLY. EXHAUST BOLT PATTER SAME AS ALL OTHER A-SERIES] bolt patterns, and still needed lots of stuff to complete the motor. Over pasta with a pal from Ray Barton Racing Engines, the Chrysler specialists near Reading, Penn., I learned we could build a better motor using a $1500 non-Magnum 360 short block and a bunch of aftermarket parts. He even offered to have RBRE assemble it. So that's what we did.
In retrospect, we should have accepted Barton's offer to dyno test the engine after it was assembled. Had we done so, we would have discovered sooner that the Chrysler 340 small-block is internally balanced
[NOT TRUE. THERE WERE ALSO EXTERNALLY BALANCED 340S MADE IN LATE-1972-73 WHEN THEY CAME WITH A CAST CRANK.-- MAYBE ADD SOMETHING LIKE WHAT FOLLOWS in upper and lower case TO THE ABOVE
"unlike the early forged-crank 340 which was internally balanced. The late 1972-73 340 and all 360s have cast cranks and are externally balanced Externally balanced motors like our 360 have to be assembled with an offset-weighted flywheel/flexplate and an offset-weighted balancer/dampener. ]
But we were too anxious to get the motor in the car and running. When we did, we found that the engine ran great, but there was a serious vibration no doubt caused by the wrong balancer and flywheel[FLEXPLATE].. But those are items we'll address in the next installment. For now, we'll concentrate on building a better small-block Mopar -- and teaching young Sam a little patience.
photos
#1--lead, no cap--bw sheet 1, frame 20
#2--short-block--color slide
Mopar Performance Parts offers two non-Magnum 360 short-blocks, identical except for basic compression ratio (9:1 or 10:1). We chose the 9:1 assembly, P4876907, as the foundation for this engine because the small-chamber cylinder heads we had would boost compression closer to 10.5:1, about max for pump gas. The block itself is seasoned (used) [I NEVER HEARD THAT THIS MP SHORTBLOCK IS ASSEMBLED AROUND A USED ENGINE BLOCK. THIS FEATURE IS NOT SPECIFIED IN THE 1999 MP CATALOG. ] and bored .020-over for a total displacement of 363.51 cubic inches (4.020 bore by 3.58-inch stroke). DOES OVERBORE THIS APPLY TO THE MP SHORT, OR JUST THE BARTON VERSION?] Inside is a cast crank, 6.123-inch forged steel rods, and hypereutectic (high nickel [SILICON, NOT NICKEL] content) cast pistons with 5/64-inch compression rings. The MPP hydraulic camshaft has .509-inch lift, 292 degrees duration, and is driven off the crankshaft by a double roller timing chain.
#3, #4, #5--heads--color slides
The key to this combination is the deep breathing Edelbrock Performer RPM aluminum heads, pn 6077, which come fully assembled for $1270 per pair! They're CNC-machined for uniformity and feature matching port volumes of 174cc (intake) and 83cc (exhaust), plus heart-shaped 65cc combustion chambers which raise our 9:1 short-block to roughly 10.5:1 compression, a significant increase. Edelbrock then installs phosphor bronze guides, stainless steel valves measuring 2.02"/1.60", springs, retainers and keepers. Furthermore, the valve seats are ductile iron [INSERTS] for use with unleaded gas, our fuel of choice. Finally, the completed Edelbrock Performer RPM heads, sans rocker assembly, weigh just 28 pounds each, and together account for a 40-pound savings over the stock cast iron heads. In the end, taking weight off the car's front end helps traction.
[MENTION HIGHER SQUEEZE COMPENATES FOR THE EFFECTS OF USING ALUMINUM HEADS RATHER THAN IRON HEADS]
#6, #7 --intake--color slides
Aiming the incoming air/fuel mixture at the appropriate port is the job of Edelbrock's Performer RPM intake manifold, pn 7176. The dual-plane aluminum intake is a perfect match for the Edelbrock Performer RPM cylinder heads, and makes power from 1500 to 6500 rpm. It fits pre-1972 340s and 360s, and accepts [4150-SERIES] Holley carburetors.
#8, #9--carburetor--bw sheet 2, frames 18 & 22
The carburetor recommended for this application is the venerable 780 cfm dual-feed Holley 4-barrel, the old 3310 now found under Holley pn 0-9188. It has a vacuum-controlled secondary throttle shaft, and we converted the choke assembly to electric to match the Mopar's existing wiring. This same [BASIC] carburetor came stock on Chevy's 375-horse 396 big-blocks in the late 1960s.
#10, #11--ignition, wires--bw sheet 1, frames 25 & 27
To help light the 360's fire, we chose the Annihilator HP ignition system from Holley, pn 800-100. It's a capacitive discharge, multiple spark ignition that fires each plug up to five times with an energy output of 135 millijoules at 525 volts. The Annhilator HP also has a built-in rev limiter adjustable from 1000-9900 rpm. Connecting the HP to the spark plugs is a set of Holley's 9mm Laser Shot 50 wires for high energy ignitions (HEI), pn 50-9865.
#12--distributor--bw print
To distribute the spark, we chose an MSD billet distributor for the small-block Mopar, pn 8534. It has a CNC-machined billet aluminum housing, injection-molded base, race rotor, and an internally adjustable mechanical advance assembly that rides on a ball bearing supported hardened steel shaft. To the stock MSD distributor we added an MSD Pro-Cap (not shown) to spread out the plug [WIRE] terminals and lessen the chance of cross-fire.
#13--gaskets--bw sheet 2, frame 30
Although we didn't need everything included, we ordered an engine teardown gasket set from Mopar Performance Parts, P4120692 (non-Magnum 340-360). It contains all the gaskets required to inspect engine bearings, bores or cylinder heads, plus oil pan, valve and timing chain covers, intake manifold and oil pump gaskets. Since we were using virgin parts, we didn't have to scrape any surfaces. We did, however, use lots of gasket sealer while bolting parts to our 360 short-block.
#14--exposed rockers--color slide tk
The stock Chrysler 340-360 valvetrain is inherently strong [AND ACCURATE] thanks to the shaft-mounted rocker assembly [SYSTEM, NOT ASSEMBLY], and we did little to improve it other than install new parts. The hydraulic [TAPPET, STAMPED STEEL] rocker arm replacement package from Mopar Performance, P4529742, includes both intake and exhaust rockers in the factory 1.5:1 ratio. We installed them on chrome rocker shafts from Speed Pro, pn RS-612, which in turn rest on pedestals cast into the Edelbrock aluminum heads. The pushrods are [SOLID] non-adjustable Speed Pro items, pn RP-5006 RK.
#15--valve covers--bw sheet 2, frame
We couldn't resist these black wrinkle valve covers from Mopar Performance, P4529026. Cast from aluminum, they're stronger and less prone to leakage, and come with gaskets, oil filler cap, screws and washers. We liked these covers so much we later bought a matching air cleaner assembly, P5249807.
[A MOROSO BREATHER WAS LATER ADDED TO THE LEFT/RIGHT COVER.]
#16--bolts--bw sheet 2, frame 14
Where we had a choice, we used grade 8 ARP bolts in our 360 buildup. The heads are secured by black oxided chrome-moly hex-heads, pn 144-3602, while we used stainless steel hexes on the intake manifold, pn 444-2001.
[STEVE- RE: ABOVE: YA HASTA ALWAYS BE SURE TO USE HARDENED STEEL HEAD BOLT WASHERS WHENEVER ALUMINUM HEADS ARE USED, UNLESS THE BOLTS ARE SPECIAL WASHERED TYPES.]
#17--lifters--bw sheet 2, frame 16
The hydraulic cam that came with the 360 short block required complementary hydraulic lifters, which we got from Comp Cams, pn 822-1. As far as Mopar applications, one size hydraulic lifter fits all small-block V8s, and all wedge-head big-blocks. We'll let you know what rpm the engine likes once we've had a little seat time with the Dart.
[NO MENTION ABOVE OF THIS BEING A HYDRAULIC ROLLER CAM USING HYDRAULIC ROLLER TAPPETS.]
#18, #19--pan, pump--bw sheet 1, frames 3 & 0
The short-block also needed an oiling system, which came from Milodon in the form of a low profile oil pan (pn 30940), pickup (pn 18345), high volume oil pump (pn 18780), and windage tray (pn 32230). The pan is trick in that it holds seven quarts of oil (instead of five) yet [THANKS TO THE BUILT-IN KICKOUT,] doesn't hang down where it's in danger of meeting manhole covers on the street. The increased volume and pressure [PUMP MAKES VOLUME NOT PRESSURE] provided by the Milodon pump gives us more confidence at higher engine speeds, and pushes the oil pressure gauge to 60 psi.
OUT #20
#21--torque heads--bw sheet 1, frame 16
Indy '99 Competition Eliminator champion Santo Volpe, who works at Ray Barton Racing Engines, assembled our 360 Mopar using a combination of aftermarket parts bolted to a factory short-block. Here Santo torques the Edelbrock Performer RPM heads to 85 foot-pounds. Barton offered to dyno test the finished engine, but we were in a hurry to get it in the car.
#22--engine in car--color slide--USE ON TOC
The calm before the storm. Our freshly assembled 360 looked great in the Dodge Dart's engine bay. It sounded great too, but had a nasty vibration. Turns out we had the wrong crank damper and flex plate. Tune in next time as we get our balancing act together and take this puppy to the drag strip.
SOURCES
ARP
531 Spectrum Circle, Dept. Dept. DRUSA
Oxnard, CA 93030
800-826-3045
Comp Cams
3406 Democrat Rd., Dept. DRUSA
Memphis, TN 38118
800-999-0853
Edelbrock
2700 California St. Dept. DRUSA
Torrance, CA 90503
310-781-2222
Holley
1801 Russellville Rd., Dept. DRUSA
Bowling Green, KY 42101
502-782-2900
Mopar Performance Parts
26311 Lawrence Ave., Dept. DRUSA
Center Line, MI 48015-1201
810-497-1225
Milodon
20716 Plummer St., Dept. DRUSA
Chatsworth, CA 91311
818-407-1211
MSD
1490 Henry Brennan Dr., Dept. DRUSA
El Paso, TX 79936
915-857-5200
Ray Barton Racing Engines
343 Belle Alto Rd., Dept. DRUSA
Wernersville, PA 19565
610-670-8591
Speed-Pro/Federal Mogul Performance
Box 1966, Dept. DRUSA
Detroit, MI 49235
248-354-7844
