Volare Wagon - T/A Kit Racer Stance

[Opticon77]

Couple more updates, though not all planned.

- Fast ratio Pitman and Idler are in with the 11/16" tie rod hardware. Old idler ball joint was dust. Nearly fell out in my hands. Yikes.

- Found the steering plunge coupler was half the cause of the full inch of slop in my "suggestion wheel". Found a slightly shorter (3" instead of 3.5") replacement at Bouchillon. Still worked fine. Thanks to Aspen500 for those links.

- I've been trying to nurse the original driveline until I'm done with Chassis/Suspension but when the old A904 started slipping in 2nd up a hill I knew I had to drop the pan... the ATF looked like candy metallic. Plus a little bit of band friction material wedged in the filter. Front and rear band adjustments look to never have been touched. Preload was about 50% out from spec (4 turns from tight on the front, 6 turns on the rear). I am NOT looking to drop a trans yet. Quick patch was to tighten the bands, flush as much of the sparkly ATF out as I could, new filter, and refill it with Ford type F and little Lucas No Slip. It's been shifting great for the last tank of gas so maybe I'll get away with that for a while.

-Oh and I had to bypass Lean Burn. Cheap GM HEI setup with Denso Iridiums thrown in for now. Finally got rid of the pinging and got the idle down where it should be but now I lost my vacuum advance. 2bbl doesn't seem that happy anyway. Maybe time for a reman Demon 1901.

STILL haven't got the sway bars or shocks under this thing. The best laid plans of mice and men.

 

[BudW]

I like to measure trans pan metal with teaspoons. No, not actually use a teaspoon to measure with but for comparison reasons. I have seen transmissions with (approximately) 1-2 teaspoons of metal in pan, that went on to survive for a very long time.
Now if metal could be measured in multiple tablespoons or if chunks are present, then that is a different matter.

1-2 teaspoons worth of fine metal with about the same amount in “gray” dust like material (paper clutch linings) is nothing to worry about and is normal, no matter what the mileage is (IMO).
If you see screws, snap ring parts or other items you can recognize – then you can keep driving the car – but start to sock away some money for a future overhaul (unless it is currently acting up).

Chrysler recommends to adjust both bands about every 30k miles – or if you drive with a heavy foot (like I do), about every 15-20k miles. In reality, the filter needs to be changed just as often.

Chrysler recommends to use ATF+4 for our vehicles. If you got the extra money, then why not.
Personally, I don't think the extra cost for ATF+4 is worth the extra expense for our cars. I recommend plain ole Dextron fluid – unless you have a specific reason for something else (like Type-F, for example) - and there can be reasons to change fluid type. Type-F fluid usage won't hurt our transmissions as well as some other types – but I can't say about some fluids that came out recently (like WS (World Standard), CVT, and so forth) yet (no experience).

One more thing – if the fluid on any Chrysler transmission has any kind of odor to it – change it! Its way past prime.

Some shops will want to perform a “fluid exchange” instead of dropping the pan (and changing the filter). The only comment I have about that is “how is both bands going to get adjusted – which will needs to be done every 30k miles (or 15-20k miles, in my case)”?

In many cases, when you drop the pan, ½ of the fluid will automatically siphon out of the torque converter. If you have one of the very few FMJ's with a converter drain plug, then you can drain pretty much all of the fluid out – but I would guess 99.9% of all FMJ's do not have the converter drain plug sense Chrysler stopped using that in about '75 – which was a shame. All lockup transmission converters will not have a drain plug.
BudW

 

[Duke5A]

I spent what little free time I had for the last three weeks trying to install a Hyperspark distributor to enable timing control. Too many problems of my own creation and some not to list. Wound up right back where I started and barely got the thing ready for Dream Cruise week. It happens to all of us.

 

[Opticon77]

I gotta get some PDR done on the passenger side. I counted about 8 good dents over there.

 

[old yellow 78]

I gotta get some PDR done on the passenger side.

I'll be interested in how that turns out. I have some mild hail damage on OY's roof, and an annoying small dent in the tailgate that I'd like to have removed, and I think PDR would be able to do it.

 

[Trey]

Nice looking wagon! I've had PDR done on several of our cars and have always been very pleased with the results. The best fix was when my wife had a deer run into the side of her Honda. The bodyshop wanted over $800 to fill and spray and PDR was only $300. It looked like it never happened and I saved $500. I also had it done recently on my F150 and even with the aluminum body they made a flawless repair. Aluminum costs a little more and they can only do so much before the metal tears but it's a good alternative if not too bad of a dent.

 

[cjd1963]

It looks great! Love it!

 

[Duke5A]

Any updates? I've been giving some serious thought to stepping back down to a 16" rim for more sidewall. Now that I've got a 4-piston front brake solution that'll fit inside a 16" at least. The roads by me are so horrible I've bent two wheels already and the ride quality is bunk.

 

[Opticon77]

The steel (although heavy) helps with that problem too.

The car is in hiding from winter salt at the moment. Of course the fuel pump had to crap out on me while it was in a basement garage nowhere near the shop lifts. So that'll be interesting. I'm also changing jobs at the moment so spare time is tough, but the project funding should get considerably better if I play this right. I'm kinda at the point with the 100k mile stock drivetrain (nursing enough old parts through stupid problems) where the smartest move is to swap the entire thing for something fresh. I was hoping to finish the chassis/suspension before it reached this point but such is life.

UPGRADE ALL THE THINGS!

 

[BudW]

Just a random comment. If you were to remove the engine/transmission, still attached to the K-frame (ie: drop K-frame/engine/transmission down and lift body up and out of the way), you might kill a couple of birds with one stone.

Also, if there is possibility of exhaust headers in the future – doing the above makes that process easier, as well.


I’m big blocking both of my cars (eventually), and what I’ll be doing is taking a spare K-frame/suspension and rebuilding/modifying for the big block and placing on a dolly. When the time comes to switch out, I’ll drop the old K with 318/904 attached on another dolly, roll that out of way and roll the big block back into its place. Drop body down and voila, it might be done in a day (or so) work (but I'm still in part gathering mode – so nowhere close to that, yet).
If you don’t have a spare K or suspension – then I see that taking a we bit longer than a weekend.
BudW

 

[Opticon77]

Ok. This is taking too long. Just get the leaky whore sealed back up so I can continue turning the A904 into dust.

Double roller timing chain, Demon 1901, 4bbl 360 intake, and every seal/gasket I could get to without loosening the head bolts. That should hold it over long enough for me to forget how much it hurts to work on cars.

 

[Opticon77]

Here we go again...

Rust.

The hell is this?...

Oh holy hell. You poor thing. I take it all back. You did the best you could...

That said. It does help explain how I eventually managed triple digits on GPS.

 

[Duke5A]

Let us know how those Vikings do. I'm really thinking about it.

 

[Opticon77]

Found and replaced the factory original rubber fuel lines at the tank and up the passenger side of the car. The style and location of the crimp clamps tucked deep in the tank insulating foam was a dead giveaway.

Bought a 4bbl bracket and bent / extended kickdown linkage to meet up with the "Demon Thermoquad II: Electric Choke Boogaloo". Throw is slightly shorter with this geometry but I biased the kickdown toward highest pressure and it still seems to shift great. Dunno if I'll bother fixing it since I should only need a year out of this setup.

100k mile engine back together with new seals everywhere. Next I have to drop the A904 and seal it.

Leaky A/C removed for now. EGR plugged. Stock worn cam advanced 2 degrees on a new and tight double roller chain. Carb worked like a charm right out of the box. The secondaries bwah so nice and now it has a good kick even through the 2.40 rear.

I have to hook up the wideband A/F meter, PCV, and get to tuning it. But the trans decided it wanted seals too. I don't have the patience to do the 4 speed swap correctly at the moment so I'll probably just throw a cheap converter and some seals at the A904.

 

[Opticon77]

Oh. And I had the Vikings on for the test drive. Full soft is still an improvement over the worn crap I had on there before. In fact I may end up running them only a 1 click up on compression and about 3 on rebound up front. Rear is still in process. I'm prepping my HD E-body spring conversion and fat sway bar for back there. The vikings on the rear definitely don't have the same extents in travel that the original springs had (at least on my iso setup). But I'm running everything lower anyway so it will work out fine for me.

Firm feel front sway bar is an absolute beast. So flat up there.

 

[Duke5A]

Looks good! Eventually I get a FF front bar. The cop bar I have was sufficient with a small block, but the added weight on the nose now is noticeable.

Whose tie rod sleeves are those? 11/16"?

 

[Opticon77]

Firmfeel. Their whole 11/16" tie rod kit.

 

[Lightning II]

Any updates? This build is fantastic.