The Lawn Dart

[Senor_Taylor]

Thank you so much for this. It's interesting and you make such large process leaps every post.

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[Deceus]

I think I only got like 5 hours on it because I didn't get moving until almost noon and then the 5pm sunset and high winds kinda shut things down. I was surprised at how much I got done. I really only intended to fix the light and fight like hell to get one seat in. Shoutout to Corbeau for not sucking. I'm debating just spending some time on it tomorrow and just working in the evening in order to get the exhaust "done" and front turn signals working before taking it down to Hampton Roads.

[Jake]

Awesome progress!

Be careful with where you dump the exhaust. DJ had his first racecar exhaust exiting right near the backseats, and it burned up the front-most differential bushing. Too much heat near the rubber.

[Deceus]

Awesome progress!

Be careful with where you dump the exhaust. DJ had his first racecar exhaust exiting right near the backseats, and it burned up the front-most differential bushing. Too much heat near the rubber.

Yeah I have a fuel line on one side and a battery cable on the other. They're not tucked away as well as they should be in the middle of the car since I'm waiting to get subframe connectors. I may bite the bullet and just pin them using the floorpan if I have to, it beats boiling my fuel. I should have around 2 inches of clearance if I do that.

To Do list before I take this thing down to scare the shit out of my family: tighten serpentine belt, do something with the exhaust, siphon out a bit more tranny fluid since it's still leaking out of the dipstick when it gets hot. Optional: do something with the fenders today since it's going to be 60 degrees.

It's also developing an oil leak at the front of the intake. Just enough to coat the top of my water pump so it's not too concerning at the moment. My crankcase pressure may be running a bit high or the cork gasket could be failing. Edelbrock recommends ditching the cork gasket and just using a fat bead of silicone with this particular intake so I may have to reinstall it if I don't find anything wrong with the PCV valve.

[Deceus]

I went and got a set of 45 degree exhaust sections and a set of turn downs. I walked past the paint aisle and saw a white sandable primer. This set off a bomb in my head. I was certain with a white base I could cover both fenders with the 2 cans of sublime green paint I had leftover from painting the door jambs. So I grabbed some sandpaper and the primer and decided I was going to paint my fenders today. I only had 2 hours til sundown so I knew I had to move fast. I did some quick sanding trying to smooth out all the wrinkles that came from painting my fenders in 100+ degrees in direct sunlight like a dumbass. I didn't get it all but it looks a lot better than it did. Some quick masking work and I was ready to paint. It was at this point I realized I only had 1 can of the sublime green because the other was plastidip. Fuck it, I decided to try and make it work. It covered pretty well, would have been a little better if I had a second can but this is simply a temporary fix until I can actually address the rapidly deteriorating paint job as a whole. I didn't build this thing to sit and look pretty anyways.

Tightened the serpentine belt after dinner and took it out to Klein's to get a better feel for the seat. Money very well spent. I can't get over how much better it feels sitting just 2 inches lower. Just need to complete the exhaust, add a few hangers and siphon a pint or 2 of tranny fluid tomorrow and she'll be ready for the holidays.

[Senor_Taylor]

What's the interior looking like nowadays? Still need to see this in person.

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[Deceus]

What's the interior looking like nowadays? Still need to see this in person.

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Pretty rough. Just the seats, sound deadener, some flaking ensolite thanks to my handbrake line leaking and of course the hydro handbrake itself. It really needs carpet over the ensolite but that's not a real high priority at the moment. My instrument panel is just a flat sheet of metal screwed into my dash. I finally found a source for a proper blank fiberglass one. Probably going to order it soonish since I can't really just roll around with it like that. I don't really trust it to stay put if shit got real at all. Last thing I want flying around is a sharp chunk of sheet metal.

[Deceus]

Exhaust is done and tranny fluid has been siphoned (again). It almost sounds street legal on the outside and it's no longer deafening on the inside. Time to pick up the uhaul trailer and pray for an uneventful trip.

[ScottyB]

sounds great - i was expecting a lot more chop with the cam but it sounds really smooth and classic.  awesome you've pushed this far through to get it to where it is.  i kinda dig the blacked-out front end too, something really in-your-face and angry about that.

i feel like you'd fit right in with these guys.  not because your car is junk, just that you're all about getting your hands dirty and getting this thing out there to tear it up without too much concern for numbers-matching concours nonsense.

[Deceus]

sounds great - i was expecting a lot more chop with the cam but it sounds really smooth and classic.  awesome you've pushed this far through to get it to where it is.  i kinda dig the blacked-out front end too, something really in-your-face and angry about that.

i feel like you'd fit right in with these guys.  not because your car is junk, just that you're all about getting your hands dirty and getting this thing out there to tear it up without too much concern for numbers-matching concours nonsense.

Yeah the cam is a little small for a muscle car. My dad's 318 has a much better sound. He went with an HE268 from Comp Cams and I went with an XE262. He has a bit more duration and top end, I have a bit more lift and low end torque. I'm happy with it so far. It seems to rev up pretty fast and behaves well on the street which is primarily what I was going for.

I'm definitely content with the rattyness the car has going on right now. More than anything I really want to get this thing somewhere I can beat on it. I'm debating on hitting up the last MBCA event in Winchester on Sunday. My only 2 concerns is the crankcase pressure issue I seem to be having and being too loud to run there.

Thanksgiving was a success. The truck towed pretty well and my dad and I got the timing dialed in a bit better. It definitely climbs past 3k A LOT better now. It seemed to be hesitating around 3200 RPM or so. Gave a few family members a ride and got to cruise around my old neighborhood which was cool. Got back in time for the C&C on Saturday which had a big turnout. Overall a good long weekend.



I got an X-pipe kit from my Dad that I plan on getting put in professionally. I'm doing some digging on the crankcase pressure issue. It seems either an exhaust valve isn't shutting all the way, my PCV isn't doing it's job or I may need to switch to breathers on both valve covers with the rings I'm using. I guess a leakdown test is probably the best place to start. I'm really hoping I don't have to take these heads off.

[Deceus]

I decided to hitup the MBCA autocross. It was mostly a success. I tried not to push the car too hard but also give everything a good workout to get a feel for what needs work. It doesn't seem to be seeping much oil from the front on the intake anymore which is good. I'm thinking the extra advance was causing the crankcase issues but I'll be sure to keep an eye on it. Unfortunately it died on me on 4 of the 6 runs. I figured it was the carb not liking the cornering too much but it seems the issue might be a bit simpler. I talked with my dad and he thinks my primaries are too rich causing it to load up on fuel when the rpms drop. This would explain why it was giving me trouble to trying to restart it on the course and why it was behaving perfectly fine as long as I was giving the gas pedal some love.

The rear was only rubbing on the driver side and only just barely hitting the sidewall. A rear swaybar and some fender massaging with solve this issue just fine. I'm not too worried about it since I'll be running a different set of tires eventually for anything involving cornering. I'll probably go with another 1/2" of backspacing as well since I have the room. Speaking of the rear tires: the car did launch pretty well, I didn't go too HAM but there were no wheel hop issues or any weird vibrations.

Here's a video of one of the runs. I can't seem to download it and facebook utterly murdered the quality even if I could.
https://www.facebook.com/johnhef82/video...229415655/

screen grab:


So at this point I need to either start pestering Coy Miller, learn how to adjust the carb myself or go with an EFI system. I was looking into the Holley Sniper system and it looks impressive. All it would take is some wiring, a return line and finding a place to mount the fuel pump ... and about $1,300. It has the added benefit of being able to work with their distributor to control timing with a handheld device.

My body is telling to just buy the EFI, I rarely hear of anyone regretting the purchase but my bank account, my bank account is telling to use the calibration kit in the garage and figure this shit out for myself since it's not rocket science. Decisions, decisions. Either way I need to start with a proper exhaust system and O2 sensor.

Oh yeah so I think using the donor K-member is coming back to bite me in the ass.



That's where my lower control arm bolts in case you were wondering. We patched it well but I didn't consider the alignment issues this would cause down the road until someone brought it up. In my defense, at that time I was still mostly just building this thing as a weekend cruiser with the occasional drag strip visit. Looks like it's time to start looking into tubular K-members. QA1 makes one but it's only for the earlier style motor mounts that had a bad habit of breaking regular under motors with any kind of torque. If it wasn't for the steering box being bolted to the K-member this would be a fairly easy swap. It would be the perfect opportunity to get hydroboost setup done at the same time though. Anyways, stay tuned. Big things happening this winter, I told you this was a never-ending story...

[Deceus]

So good news/bad news: it doesn't seem like my transmission has been leaking. It looks like my crankcase pressure has been causing oil to come out of the base of my oil filter as well. My guess is that something is happening at WOT that's causing pressure to build up. My bellhousing was catching some of of the oil and that explains why it's been dripping out of the front when parked with no real sign of a leak anywhere within the bellhousing itself. It's apparently getting worse because the whole front of my trans was covered after a quick run to get some gas.

Gonna change my oil to see exactly how much I've lost since my dipstick is a little unreliable and do a leakdown test. Hopefully I'm not tearing the engine apart but right now it's looking like an issue with the rings or valves. Current theories are that my rings aren't seated well or an exhaust valve isn't closing all the way.

[Senor_Taylor]

Just remember it's probably the most simple solution you can think of. Don't glance over simple stuff because it's "too easy".

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[Deceus]

Ye, gonna test the PCV and try to run 2 breathers before I do anything crazy like pull the engine or heads. If that doesn't work, it's time for a leakdown test which will tell me where the air is escaping.

[Deceus]

Well the PCV valve isn't the issue. Looks like I'm pulling the trigger on a leakdown tester and compressor. Have the house to myself all next week so it's time to party.

[Deceus]

So this probably explains a lot:



I have six pushrods that are bent pretty bad. Not sure how or how much damage it did. I'm thinking they were a hair short and the slop in the stock style rockers let them wander just enough to bind up. It would make a lot more sense if there were 8 bent and not six since I could blame the intake or exhaust side. Time to do things the expensive way. Ordering some adjustable rocker arms. From there I'm going to put a dial indicator on each rocker to measure the lift to see if I wiped any of the lobes. I guess I should pull my intake to get a look at the lifters and cam at a minimum. I'd like to pull the heads as well if I'm opening that can of worms though.

The leak-down test came back good for all but 2 cylinder. Everything was holding around 90 psi with the tool set at 100 but 2 cylinders were at 22 psi. There's no way I was running with that kinda leakage in 2 cylinders. I spun the engine around until it was at TDC on the compression stroke again and they were good. Tried it a third time and they were bad again. It seems the rings aren't fully seated in these cylinders, only way I can explain that. More motivation to open it up I guess. The scope didn't show any marks on the pistons at least.

It's getting real tempting to start tallying up what I can part out on this engine and front end to simply redo it as a proper restomod with a newer Hemi. For the price I paid in machine work and bling, I very easily could have had a running 6.4L with the necessary K-member to make it straight drop in and go swap. The major flaw in this plan is I'll be stuck selling to a small subset within a small subset. Convincing the average Mopar guy a 318 is worth anything more than a boat anchor is a battle I don't feel like fighting. You can't even mention the word aftermarket without at least a couple guys swearing that stamped steel from 1970 is the best thing ever made to corner around a track at 100 mph.

Time to bust out the booze and spreadsheets.

[WRXtranceformed]

Urgh man...

As someone who has had an engine built up, if I had to do it all over again it would have been some kind of drop-in crate solution.

[D_Eclipse9916]

Urgh man...

As someone who has had an engine built up, if I had to do it all over again it would have been some kind of drop-in crate solution.

+1

[Deceus]

Fortunately I'm a glutton for punishment. Gonna try to take the intake and heads off this weekend. Not gonna be able to do anything but guess until I do. Now if only work would calm down enough for me to take a shit without being asked for an update lol.

[Deceus]

Pulled the intake and only see 1 questionable lobe. Gonna have to bust out a dial indicator and double check everything is still giving me the right amount of lift. And now for the bad news: my rocker shafts where installed on the wrong sides. This means the oiling holes were pointing upwards instead of down which obviously isn't the best of oil flow. This probably caused the exhaust vales to drag and bend the push rods. Also explains the excessive crankcase pressure. Looks like I'm popping the heads too. I think if I have to redo everything I may try to go with aluminium heads and roller cam.