1970 DODGE CHARGER
*STILL NEEDS A NAME*
The flagship of our automotive fleet, been in my possession since the late 90's, the 1970 Dodge Charger has a long history with me, having been reintroduced to the streets in 98 and been like a sidekick to me like the General Lee was to the Duke boys. I drove this car all over the streets of the Chicagoland area and even points beyond, having a good time and making many friends along the way. It's interesting how a car can do so many things from a social perspective. This car came equipped with a 440 Magnum big block V8 mated to a 727 Torqueflite automatic transmission with a reverse manual valve body. A 4bbl Edelbrock carburetor topped off the engine. The last time this car seen the road was in 2006, just before we moved to rural MS. It seen a brief span of road time, not even enough miles to be worth mentioning before it ended up being parked. Ironically, the amount of time this car sat idle on the grass in our yard did more damage to this car than all the times this car rode the streets of Chicago and had snow pile on top of it occasionally.
While In Chicago I did have to do some patching on the rear quarters, nothing too serious but enough that it needed addressing. I had paint put on the car and it was fine for a little while but after being parked, it didn't take too long for moisture to take its toll. The first thing was the mold that started forming in the interior, mainly the carpet. Of course the vinyl top was a wick to absorb even more moisture, causing rust pinholes to form on the roof, allowing more moisture to eventually wick into the interior, wetting the carpet, which along with the mold, also started slowly rusting the floor out too.
I had started to do work on this car, especially since at the same time the powertrain was showing serious signs of fatigue, enough so to warrant an overhaul. In the process of gutting the interior to rid it of the moldy material, I also got started with removing the powertrain in order to overhaul everything. I disassembled the engine, sending the heads to a machine shop to be reworked, while I worked on the block. After getting the engine done I rebuilt the transmission as well. Putting everything back together, taking time to paint things to help protect and make things look nice, I was able to start the engine up for a short spell, only to have some weird quirks appear from the engine. Also the transmission failed to function. This was a major fail with a capital F. Because of this, the car ended up being parked yet again for a while.
A shot of the Dodge back around 2000 when the car was at its peak back in IL.
After moving down south, the car sat for some time, slowly degrading. At one point I attempted to rebuild the powerplant in the field, pulling the old 440/727 setup and disassembling and rebuilding it on the ground. Apparently some steps were missed and the engine sounded bad, ran hot after a while, and even the transmission didn't work. The car sat longer. As time passed, the body rotted to the point that some attention had to be given. I had to do a bunch of sheet metal work, cutting out the rear half of the car and replacing the bulk of the sheet metal. Even the rear subframes needed to be rebuilt, using hardware store iron stock, since replacing the rotted metal with replacement automotive iron was even more cost prohibitive than the body metal.
The rot of the sheet metal and structural iron was extensive.
Rear subframes reconstructed with flat stock and angle iron, connecting to what's left of the rear frame rails at the rear axle.
Rear quarters and rocker panels replaced and roof metal patched on with lead filler to fill in rust holes. Front fenders had to be patched heavily as well due to extensive rot and the lack of replacement 1970 year fenders.
Topping off the body repair is a replacement taillight panel and valence panel.
Fast forward a few more years. I finally decided that the car needed to be brought back to life. One of the first things that I did after pulling the old powerplant out was go back under the chassis and reinforce everything with fresh metal on both the front and rear subframes. Areas around where the K-member mounts and even the torsion bar support needed reinforcement. The brakes were rebuilt along with the suspension. The car was completely rewired from scratch with an aftermarket fuse box and a lot of scrap wiring, kept neat with zip ties and clean routing of wire bundles. A lot went into getting the wiring right and could've been much easier buying even a generic wiring harness. The floors needed heavy patching just as well. I also took a moment to do a reconfiguring of the HVAC box, similar to how I did the 76 Elco, setting the system up to just blow air through the chest level vent and defrost vents all the time.
With the BB powerplant having apparent problems from the rebuild, I decided to try and build a smallblock powerplant from a couple 318 engines. One of the engines was pretty trashed and ran poorly due to a couple of shot pistons and head gaskets. which required using a 2nd engine that was half assembled but oddly seized but with a decent auto transmission. Even though we went through all the steps to properly assemble the engine, even checking ring gaps and utilizing proper torque specs, we still had problems. We had the crank checked to verify the grind and matched bearings to the crank, only to still have problems with seized connecting rod bearings, letting me know that some of the rod bearings were probably out of round and would've needed to be cut to get them true again. We recorded a series of videos documenting the process of building the 318 engine, which can apply to other small block mopar engines, but for obvious reasons they are for informational purposes only. Our rebuild falls into what some may call a "dingleball rebuild" or "redneck rebuild", where cylinder heads aren't worked, the block isn't worked, rods/crank aren't worked, nothing that a "professional" builder would overlook. This would've worked if we were breaking down a still working engine that was merely worn out but still functional. Our set up was literally pieced together from a bunch of parts.
There are nine videos in the 318 rebuild series, if you want to watch all nine videos, just search the playlists tab and find the 1970 Dodge Charger 318 Engine Rebuild playlist.
Even with the apparent headaches from the botched 318 rebuild, that didn't stop me from further trying to build the car out. I took a moment to upgrade the headlights to LED's using H4 housings with aftermarket H4 LED bulbs. Along with that I also made crude yet effective door panels to replace the completely trashed door panels which would've been pretty expensive to replace. Using old wall paneling and some hobby store black vinyl sheet and fabric adhesive, I made templates of the old door panels with cardboard, using this to trace out the pattern on the paneling so all holes can be cut for the window cranks and armrest bolt holes. After gluing the vinyl sheet in place, I was able to cut out the holes and secure the panels to the doors, completing things with the reinstallation of the window crank and armrest for each door. I made interior panels for the rear seat area, accommodating the rear window cranks just as well.
With the ratty 318 in place, the car sat a little more. While on a trip in Texas, we managed to run across a 413 BB powerplant that was pulled from an RV for pretty cheap. The engine ran fine, which sold me instantly. After getting the rig home, I had to do some work to ready this setup for installation into the Dodge. Since the 413 was set up for severe duty, it had these huge cylinder heads and this huge hunk of metal that was a water pump. All of that hardware was removed and the cylinder heads from the 440 were removed and installed onto the 413 short block. When all was said and done, the 413 was more or less reconstructed as a faux 440, using everything from the 440 other than the short block. The transmission, being specific to use in an RV, had a weird short tail with an integrated brake, none of which can be used in our vehicle. I pulled apart the faulty 727 and found what was wrong with it, and using some of the parts from the RV 727 transmission, reassembled our car transmission, confident that the thing should work. But, just in case, I fabricated a crude test stand using a pallet and some other wood to support the powerplant on the ground, using the Dodge's radiator and hoses and doing a crude wiring setup to the engine for the sake of being able to light off the engine on the ground.
With the new used powerplant cleared and ready to go I went ahead and broke everything down to install into the car. The tractor with the front end loader that I normally use for lifting engines and transmissions was most likely not gonna be able to lift such a heavy weight safely so the only safe option would be to install the engine separately then slide the transmission under the car and onto the tranny jack and lift and work it in place. It sucks but its better than dropping 1000lbs of weight or flipping the tractor over due to imbalance. With the powerplant in place and everything hooked up, I was able to start the test driving and tuning.
While playing around with test driving and just enjoying the fact that this car is finally able to move under its own power for the first time in almost 20 years, I had some serious issues with tuning the engine, first with the faulty aftermarket HEI hybrid distributor, then the power steering pump, and then with the carburetor. I ended up having to replace the oddball distributor with a knockoff Mopar electronic distributor then adding an HEI module externally right next to the distributor in order to keep things somewhat clean versus the regular Mopar electronic ignition that has its module on the engine bay side panel. I had to also replace the power steering pump as the thing would leak its oil out after only a short time running, due to the gasket in the housing being bad. I had to change from an older style Federal PS pump to the more common Saginaw pump that's more common on GM engines. As for the carburetor, after wrestling with the old carburetor and trying to change out jets and springs, I ended up giving in and ordering a new faux Edelbrock carburetor. The old carb as well as a spare I had were just crappy inside and unable to operate properly. Once I got the new carb on, i had the Dodge able to spin the tires and even chirp the tires when shifting into 2nd gear. Unfortunately, the engine started running hot after a short time. Even after replacing the old water pump with a high flow aftermarket unit and even adding an extra electric cooling fan, the engine still ran hot after a while. The next move will be pulling the thermostat then replacing the radiator with an aftermarket aluminum unit.
