1970 duster Kinda pro-touring, somewhat lo budget build

alright, budget first

previous total: 7813.15

subtract 500 for the tranny parts sales

brings car to 7313.15

now, the money ive spent:

71.15 at summit for oil pan gasket, exhaust clamps, and rear main seal

215 for mass backed carpet from previous post

39 for trabs mount and mustang roller pilot from o'reilleys

37 fpr three quarts of redline at bradly auto parts (in indian trail, just outside charlotte. support your local speedshop, or no one else will. bradly sells most the stuff i need cheaper and quicker than mail order. also, those guys are a weath of knnowledge, and own pageland dragstrip. really, really great guys. go see them. now.)

and i traded my old spoiler for teh floorpan and crossmember stuff i needed.

so after selling my truck this morning to the same guy that bought my old track s10, i went on down to the shop. the only plans for today were to get the bellhousing, flywheel, clutch, etc out, and get the oil pan drpped out. i didnt expect a six hour fight, and having to remove the headers.

had to pull the header to head bolts out to allow the engine to rotate down enough for the lakewood bell to clear the trans tunnel. the TTI's were sitting on the t-bars, making it impossible. i also hat to pull them outward to clear the pan rails so i could removine it. the stage 8 locking header blts all came apart really easy. very, very glad i neversiexed all that. headers were off, and i got to looking at the TTI gasket on the passengers side verses the copper i have on the drivers side. the copper blocks roughly 25% of the exhaust port. holy crap. gonna have to fix that....

also found that my new idler arm is alread loose, my rag joint os loose, annd that i have some slagged wiring at the firewall bulkehead. thats just great.....

but the good news is its all out. bellhousing came down with a minimum of fuss after dropping the headers, amd the clutch/flywheel came out nice and easy. figured id show the durability of the spec stage 2+ after 10k miles, tons of dragstrip passes, hundreds of autocross runs, and thousands of powershifts. minimal wear. heck, teh flywheel still had surfacing marks on it....

i then went to drop the leaking oil pan. this is a nice, 7 quart kevco with custom fabbed pan rail reinforcements, trap doors, and a windage tray. great product, and i remember it being very cheap for all the features. fuit the car with no mods whatsoever, and ive NEVER experienced oil starvation.

getting it out was another story entirely. it was a nightmare, even with a lift. the reason is this:

what do you notice missing? look close....

those are ARP 12 point bolts. when i built the motor, i used POR15 engine painting kit, great, durable product as you can tell by the pictures previously. problem is, on the bottom of the engine, it filled ALL the notches on the bolts. making it impossible to remove them with a 12 point socket.

unless youre stubbron and have a big hammer.

i "tapped" the socket up on as many of the bolts as i could get to to get them loose. the ones that i couldnt get a socket on with an extension or hammer room, i sued some vice grips. took me 3 hours to remove the bolts. majjor, major buzzkill. but its obviously out, as i showed a picture of the inside. kinda spoiled the suprise, there....

before i left for the night (jenn and mary asked for me to come home early for ribs and veggitales), i took some comparison pictures of the a833 vs the tremec trans. never saw any pictures showing the size difference, so i figured this might help someone....

i also dropped the flywheel at o'reilleys for a resurface.

so the plan for tomorrow is to get my new moroso 1 piece pan gasket up and in, the bellhousing modified, and the floor cut out. ould also like to get some clean up and organization going. i took the whole of next week off to do this swap, so im taking my time and trying to enjoy myself.

new budget total 7675.30

when i start my elcamino build, id like to get to almost this level, with a TOTAL budget of 10k. and a big block. and an automatic.

more tomorrow night. hopefully with a real camera instead of my cell phone.

yall have a good evening, and god bless. dont forget to be grateful for your blessings, and problems. cause all the priobles we have are problems of privelege, if you think about it. (if you cant figure that out, PM me and ill explain it)

michael

Michael,

Can you post some more pics of the oil pan?

I haven't tried the Moroso pan gasket yet. The Milodon 1-piece is based off the Magnum style gasket. The Magnum pans don't have the dimples at the corners of the curved parts of the sealing surface. Using a Magnum style gasket on the early pan will cause a leak.

Mock up the gasket before wrestling the pan back in place. I know what it's like to have to pull the pan back out once the headers are in.

Rob_Mopar wrote: Michael, Can you post some more pics of the oil pan? I haven't tried the Moroso pan gasket yet. The Milodon 1-piece is based off the Magnum style gasket. The Magnum pans don't have the dimples at the corners of the curved parts of the sealing surface. Using a Magnum style gasket on the early pan will cause a leak. Mock up the gasket before wrestling the pan back in place. I know what it's like to have to pull the pan back out once the headers are in.

i wish i had read that before now.....

it was the milodon.

i did RTV the snot out of those areas, though, as thats the major point my last one was leaking. so lets PRAY. ill deal with it leaking.....

it took me 10 hours today, and i had to modifyu the windage tray to get it all back together. i have a headache, so ill post the two days updates tomorrow....

sdo i pretty much lost a day yesterday to the oil pan, and only NOW realized why. it is up and in, though, and the new gasket, celaned bolts, cleaned pan, etc is all in place and happy.

reason i lost a day that i just discovered? i put the rear baffle in BACKWARDS. yes, backwards. counterintuitive, i know. so i wound up trimming, test fitting, trimming, test fitting, grinding, filing, etc. all because i put the stupid thing back together backwards.....

picture of the pan gasket. be carfeful. this turns out to be the magnum pan gasket, just in a different box. something i learned after getting it all back together. heres to hopiong it dont leak....

picture of 7 years of abuse, 10k miles, etc on the POR15 engine paint. this is after going through the parts washer to clean it up.

i started out thismorning getting the stuffing knocked out of me by my bellhousing. no lie, my ribs still hurt. put the bell up on the workbench to drill the new mounting pattern (had to make a center punch out of a grade 8 bolt tp get the exact center of the hole). drilled it out step by stem to remain accurate. got the 1/2 inch gear reduction makita out, and started reaming for the final size. when the drill got caught, i had a good enough hold on it that it rotated the bell into me with a good amount of force. on every hole. only after getting done, i thought about putting it on the floor and standing on it to prevent that. so take the tip from me.

also got the nuts welded to the inside today. (no inside bellhousing shot...)

i had another aw, shoot moment. when my machinist and i turned down the front bearing retainer on the tremec, we used stock small block four speed retainer dimensions. unfortunately, that is NOT what the lakewood requires. apparently i nefver noticed this when i built the drivetrain last time. the lakewood has one thats about 1/2 inch bigger, or the same size as a big block trans. luckily, the giy that bought my four speed had an adapter ring that came with one of his lakewood bellhousings. cost me 20 bucks, but the alternative was to buy another retainer, have it overnighted in, and then have it machined. just not gonna happen for less that 150 bicks. so the adapter it is!!

i finished the day out by starting to make a nice, precise, HUGE FREAKING HOLE in my floor. this was a very scary and difficult thing to do, as i hate, hate, hate cutting cars up. but, there was no way around it thius time. also removed the 4 speed hump at the same time, or the hole would have been considerably smaller.

tomorrows plan is to build my adapter for the poly trans mount to the tremec pattern, and test fit. hopefully it goes well and i can make the mating semi permanent tomorrow, and start putting the car back together. then making a floor.....

michael

Good luck today. I'm taking some notes from this for future reference.

Stock POR15 engine paints. Strong stuff.

When drilling scattershield bolt/clamp it to something solid first!

Holy crap man, I don't think I'd have the stones to take that big of a chunk of floor out! I am in awe.

Good luck and keep the updates coming!

Javelin wrote: Holy crap man, I don't think I'd have the stones to take that big of a chunk of floor out! I am in awe. Good luck and keep the updates coming!

you. the woute of the day was "sack up and cut it, man!"

single hardest thing ove eveer had to do to ca car. mkay require professional help....

Rob_Mopar wrote: Good luck today. I'm taking some notes from this for future reference. Stock POR15 engine paints. Strong stuff. When drilling scattershield bolt/clamp it to something solid first!

and also do not use your 50 year old gear reduction 1/2 inch drill at face level.

also, think twice, cut once....

and good day....

got a late start today, after taking my daughter to school and getting my moms crx going again.

started by figuring my trans mount adapter out. not the orettiest welding, but then again, my autodarkening helmet died, so i was doing it by squeezing my eyes shut. picked up a new one on the way home tonight, but my eyes hurt....

took the extra "plate" they gavem cut it in half, welded it on, drilled some new holes, trimmed the overall length, and rammed her home.

the hole in the floor did not start to heal overnight, either. great googly moogley, its a big hole.....

i also spent a little bit getikng holes tapped in the welded nuts, making sire the new crossmember would fit (it needed all the holes clearanced about 1/8 to 1/4 inch to line up properly. not the fault of the crossmember, but probably due to the fact that this car has been wrecked quite a few times, and spent at least 6 hours on a frame machine in my ownership...) also had to clearance the holes in the tremec slightly to make assembly easier. just a little opening of the holes, and were good.

i then went on to cut the t-bar crossmember out. had to. no other way around it.....

bolted up the bellhousing (no clutch/flywheel. wanted to check pilot bearing engagement.)

bolted up the trans

pulled the VSS out where i didnt cut enough from the t-bar crossmember

jacked the trans into place

cut the crap outta my left hand on jagged floor

sat in car, running through all five speeds making vroom vroom noises and giggling.

doesntr look like a lot in the pictures, but it was a lot pf work.

figured out the driveshaft length: 49 inches. my stock a-body is 49 1/4. im thinking that only 3/4 of an inch out of the trans may be a little tight. 49 is with one full inch out. im dropping both driveshafts off at the drivashaft shop in the morning.

plans for tomorrow:

trim teh last part of the t-bar crossmember

stitsch weld t-bar crossmember to whats left of the floor pans

install clutch/flysheel/starter/all bellhousing bolts

install trans for final time

figuire out what to do about giant freaking hole

start reassembly of the rest if theres still time.

not too shabby for 8-4 mon and tues, 5-10 friday, 8-5 sat, and 9-5 sun.

this includes parts runs, bsing, cursing, head scratching, and the god awful oil pan job....

Michael

Nice work! How's the shifter location seem compared to the original 4-speed?

seems to be in the same line, just center of the car. hard to tell for sure, as there IS no center of the car. or 4 speed hump. or floor. or......

so, quick and dirty update:

the car fought me. i bled. a lot.

started the morning by taking the driveshafts to the driveshaft guy. should have it back in the AM.

pulled trans back out, trimmed the offending area of the t-bar crossmember for the VSS clearance, and ground down a lot of sharp edges. not enough, as im pretty sure stock in neosporin, hydrogen eroxidem and bandaids have gone up today.

put the fluwheel, clutch, and bell in for final time. set the trans in, and spent the next 4 hours triung to get it all to line up again. finally got pissed and manhandled it in, as my tranny jack was making it complicated and cumbersome for some reason. it went in smooth as butter yesterday, but that was without the clutch, etc. finally got it home, and all bolted and torqued down. also got all my hardware put back together for the bellhousing (like 75 bolts in that thing. seriously...)

put the starter back in, and the drivers side TTI header. then cleaned up, and took my daughter to the park.

ill be getting a late start tomorrow, between driveshaft shop, big block el camino, and dr appt. might only get the passengers side header, driveshaft, dist, clutch linkage, and wiring back in. but ill be happy at that. them jsyt nut and bolt check, throw a seat in it, attach the steering column, and test drive it. gotta be easy on this car for about 5-600 miles for clutch break in. thats gonna be tough.....

so, budget concerns first:

flywheel turining: 25 bucks

driveshaft: 75

previously mentioned adapter rung: 20

new total: 7795.30

so. started today by double checking my work from yesterday. missed a couple of fasteners getting tightened down.

went down and picked up my driveshaft. had driveline specialties in monroe, Nc do the work. good guys, and said that theyd take care of the 8.75 under wearrenty if it was giving me any crap. so cool!

came back, inctalled clutch linkage, wiring, steering column, exhaust (re-used the crappy copper gaskets i had. yes, they leak like a sieve. yes. they need to go away. quickly.), repaird the cut tubes with the summit band clamps, hooed up my steering linkage, put in a seat, etc. adjust the clutch be general feel, same with timing.

filled all the fluids, ran over my checklist again, and pulled the pin.

fired right up. adjusted the base timing by ear (need to do it for real tommorow), made sure the clutch released and engaged, stuck it in reverse, and went around the test loop. came back 5 miles later.

i like this trans. shifts like butter. i know its been gotten into before, as dustin was told that it had upgraded input shaft, synchros, shift rails, etc. i believe it after driving it. so smooth. i like the gear ratios. 5th gear lugged it pretty good, so i didnt get to play wit that too much. definately need to work on tuning the carb a bit better till i get the EFI up and running.....

ad the huge hole in the floorpan lets in a ton of fumes, hot airr, and noise.

but the fact of the matter is, i had not planned a test drive until the end of sunday. i am 3 DAYS ahead of schedule. thats just ungheard of for me. it felt very, very cool to have been able to do this swap. dad was there as a second set of hands as i needed him, but spent moist his time rennovating his woodshop. i was his second set of hands after thoroughly scrubbing them. ive missed working with my dad. reqally missed it.

so tomorrow: clean up shop, fill tank, set timing, adjust clutch a little better, nut and bolt check, DRIVE IT.

bill and i talked tonight about the huge hole. he came up to the shop, and took a look. honestly, for what its worth, im going to let him fix the hole. it will come out nicer and cleaner lettingh the pro do that part. ill be rewiring the 68 firebird for him, (and its going up for sale once he proves it runs), and hhes just going to knock the floor off my bill. so we both win.

michael

Impressive. I'm watching closely, as I too have the dream of five speeds in my A-body for cheap(ish).

Slightly OT, I really like your dash design. Did you start with a Rallye dash or did you modify a base square-speedo setup?

Color me jealous and congrats on the test drive!

Very cool car and great writing. I dig it.

love this thread, love this car. Keep up the good work!

psteav wrote: Impressive. I'm watching closely, as I too have the dream of five speeds in my A-body for cheap(ish). Slightly OT, I really like your dash design. Did you start with a Rallye dash or did you modify a base square-speedo setup?

i had a white faced, brushhed aluminum overlay square cluster in the car for a while, among various other configurations. whats in there now is a stockish 1969 barracuda bezel. the bezel itself was just drilled for the LED's, and cleaned up from where it was broken by the radio (also to clear my DIN sized radio) also had to plate the center hole for the only availible (at the time) 2 1/16 tach. that plate will be coming out, and some revisiongs getting done when i do the harness, as my mom got me a 3 1/8 tach for christmas. i have the coolest mom on the planet. the back pot metal part of the cluster was cut, ground, reshaped, drilled, tapped, etc. top clear the autometer gauges. used the arctic white street rod series stuff with the chriome bezels, and domes lenses. set them in from behind as the reveals in the bezels lined up perfectly with the holes in the factory bezels.

when i tear the car down and redo stuff, ill make sure to show pics of how i did it, and what i would do differntly.

and thank you ALL for the feedback. its nicve to know other guys are rooting for my insanity, cheapskatedness, annd kink of writing.

maybe i should actualluy use spelling and grammar check, and see if they want some sort of article for the mag? would this stuff be interesting to teh general reader? i know im a autocross/mopar nut, so im a little more bent than most, and a knucke dragging family man on a strict side money budget....

i dunno. if the mag guys are reading my incoherent, rambling, uneloquent drivel and are somehow interested, theyll contact me. im not intereted in publication or profit, just sharing my life and passions.

2 words...

Bad

Berking

ASS!!!

Just read the whole thread (well, read most of the posts with pictures in them lol)...and that is TRULY the way a build thread should be... Drive it, find problems, fix them, drive it. Drive it harder. Fix more problems. Autocross it. Launch the snot out of it. Break something. Fix 4 things, upgrade 2. More autocross. Win a show. Drive it a really long way. Find more problems. Fix them. Swap trans, then drive some more, then some more...

Cant wait to see where she goes when you break into the EFI stage...PLEASE keep us posted!

alright, final update for the week.

the car is back home from my dads shop.

i LOVE the new trans. 70 MPH at 2k is soooooo nice. shifts like butter, no popout anymore, good gear spacing.

was unable to drive it much due to sucking exhaust and fumes through the huge floor hole. i HAVE to fix that before even thinking about driving it. i was physically sick by the time i got home, light headed, and a little confused. pretty sure i would have blacked out before too much longer from sucking too much exhaust. this was with the drivers side window OPEN, by the way. so be careful. i did order TTI header and collector gaskets to replace the crappy, leaking coppers on the car now. im pretty sure the drivers side isnt song anything but adding weight at this point.

the shifter handle is also so long that its all but unusable. since i have it, and i likke the looks, im goping to cut it off, turn it down some, and rethread it. see if i can make a stick i like that fits me. and ill show you how i do it, when i do it.

clutch is bedding in nicely alrerady, and i got it adjusted today. set the base timing again, but forgot to tighten the distributor clamp, so it changed on the way home.

no oil pan drips. for teh first time since i built the car. sooooooooo nice.

the car has developed a slight miss. i think i cracked an insulator on a plug doing all that work. its my only guess. but again, safety is primary to me, so it will wait until theres a floor again. also need to tune the carb a bunch, as it was really unhappy at 2k in 5th gear.

all in all, im very, very pleased with the steps forward and backwards this swap has made to the car. will be even happier when it has a floor, and is not soo loud duer to exhaust leaks and engine noise.

my next project is actually due to this:

its my great grandfathers 1939 craftsaman wood lathe. i have a kink for old tools, and like to restore and use them. my granfather rebuilt this lathe, my father built the stand, and i built the riser blocks and installed the jackshaft assembly. i enhoy turining canes and bowls to give away. its stress relieving. but since i left my job at voc rehab, i have not turned. when my father gave this to me, i had no room. so now im making it. and getting my shop better organized in the process. to that end, im adding more light, building a BUNCH more storage and workspace, and discarding useless crap that i have laying around. also trying to make the shop more workflow friendly. working at my dads really reminded me how nice it is to have space, a clean workbench, and organization to the point where ypou can actually find what you need. i know his shop is 7x bigger than mine, but the same principles apply here.

first thing to be done is to add a large wall cabinet in the corner behind the garage door track, to get things off the floor, and make two floor standing shelves go away. then i can put my bandsaw and fridge away, and get my nut and bolt racks hung and filled. also getting rid of the gray shelves for a workbench with drawers, and a wall cabinet that uses every availible inch of space.

som heres shop pics of what ill be doing in a mad thrash to get ready for boills firebird

and if anyone wants to kow more about the shop rebuild, ill throw it in this thread, since it IS relevant to the car. the car will be parked beside/under the stuff im building for the shop.

michael

Michael, nice work! I'm quite envious of your oil pan sealing. The functioning 5-speed swap is pretty cool too.

On your shifter, it looks like a plain shorty straight Hurst stick might work. Or an E-body pistol grip.

I was going to recommend going with the genuine TTI gaskets. I keep a set of small block and big block ones on the shelf at the shop. They do tend to last a good bit longer than some of the aftermarket ones.

In reply to Dusterbd13:

i heart this thread. i was also going to ask about dash cluster since i spent some time behind the wheel of '72 and '73 dusters BITD and only remembered the square-ish speedometers. i'm not a fan of white-faced gauges, but that's really the only thing i'd change if your duster was mine. i love builds like this, taking something vintage and perhaps overlooked by the masses, and making it a capable driver in today's traffic. well done!

quick and dirty update since ive pretty much been up since 6:30 monday morning.

the shop is put back together. started to hang the cabinet on the wall behind the garage door track friday night, when i fell off the ladder. felt better when it quit hurting.

saturday afternoon, got back at it. attached my 3/4 spacers to the wall with tapcons (to clear conduit), and looked at my handiwork. realized that i forgot to account for what is above the door when it is open, namely 2 inches of bracketry/etc that hangs past the track. cussed, scratched my head, and drove to lowes for sawzall blades. was just gonna cut it off.

luckily, the add for garage door doctor came on the radio on the way home from lowes. figured id call for a professional opinion before doing something stupid and irrepairable. glad i did, as the guys said that it wasnt if, but WHEN the door fell, and that it would be in the up position. above the duster. not cool. so they offered to move the whole door to the left for a 100 bucks. this was at 8:00 on a saturday night, when i had two people lined up on sunday after church to help me hang the cabinet. so i told them to do it. we gained almost all the space i needed but 1/16th of an inch. so i still need to tweak the brace a hair, but not much. only comes in contact with the door up. may call them back for fine tuning. havent decided yet.

regardless, cabinet went in sunday, and then got the support beam underneath it. due to space, i had to do it this way. and man, was it a fight to get it up there.

but it worked perfect. took 2 shelves and some piles, and put it ALL in this cabinet with some room to spare for supplies off the gray she;lves and floor. so nice. this was monday after work when i got that done. i thjen got a call from bill that the firbird was showong up this morning, a week ahead of schedule. had tools, debris, trash, and stuff all over the shop. thrash time. worked all night. got my bandsaw and shop fridge put away, and my nut/bolt bins hung. still have about a dozen more to hang, and then start filling them and labeling them.

sometime late last night, before she went to bed, my wife came down and helped me do some rework to my lights. previously i had the 4 four footers about 5 feet in from the walls, and 3 or 4 in from the center beam. i had 3 more sitting in the boxes, with bulbs. she suggested moving them to about 18 inches from the walls so they could better bounce light to where i was working, and adding one to the center of the bay, and one at either end.

worked perfect. really lit up that work bay and made a world of difference. i can actually see now!!!

got all this done this morning with enough time to take an hour nap, grab a shower, and get to work. im fried.

next is taking care of my nut and bolt buckets to get them off the workbench and floor before tacling the basket case that rolled off the roll back.

good night.

michael

got the rest of my bins hung, and started dealing with my cans of nuts/bolts/junk.

my wife also rules!!! she made me stickers for all my bins so theyre easy to identify.

so I got the duster back on my lunch break today. I was stoked.

the body shop has had it since the middle of January. living in a corner. I know bill did it as a favor, but at least he could have covered it. it is FILTHY. everywhere. I have hours upon hours of cleaning to do to get it back to where it was when I dropped it off. but then again, it’s a body shop. a full production, insurance primary, restoration when its slow body shop. and the floor was free. so I cant complain too much.

the floor bill built is great, nice and tight to the trans, looks good, and he stitch welded the torsion bar stubs to the floors for me while it was there. turned out really, really nice. I'm pleased. I also swapped the stick in the car out of my el-camino. fits perfect. was too short in the elky, but not in the duster. ill try to use the duster stick in the elky, unless I find my 700r4. anyway, here's pics of the floor.

bill, however, did create some issues for me to deal with. for some reason, he cut the main battery cable in half, then kinda spliced it back together. its not cool. so ill be replacing the whole main cable.

he also stripped a lot more of the sound deadening and insulation off than I had anticipated. so ill deal with that as well. the speedo doesn’t work now, probably didn’t get grounded under the seat bolt like I had it.

plans for the very near future:
1. replace exhaust gaskets.

2. figure out shift boot

3. find why its running like crap. I retimed it, but need to check out all the plugs when im doing header gaskets.

4. fix AC, interior lights, radiator venting, battery cable, speedo, right rear taillight.

5. replace/upgrade all floor insulation/sound deadening

6. clean

7. reinstall carpets and interior

8. drive and fine tune.

and lastly, pics of it home and filthy. ill probably get started on the exhaust tomorrow night after I strip out the suspension on the elky. its time for that truck to get on the road as my new truck.