Rekindled Love

No more drums to be found here! I swapped in some 12" rear discs last summer. Now connected via Hel Performance braided stainless lines to match the front. 

So many custom touches. Sick Truck! 

In reply to OjaiM5 :

Thank you!

After years of threatening to do so, I finally bit the bullet and purchased a Hemi for the Dakota. These are the photos from the seller's site, but I'll share more images when it arrives. 

It's a 392 Hemi attached to a Tremec TR6060 6-speed out of a 2018 Challenger. It's rated at 485 horsepower and 475 lb-ft of torque, but it'll have a bit more than that by the time it's in the truck and running. It's complete, damage-free, and has less than 60K on it. Holley has developed a whole bunch of goodies that will make this a bolt-in swap, but I'll still need to order a custom driveshaft, fabricate the clutch hydraulics, make a new intake, potentially have some headers made, new exhaust, and probably a few dozen other things I haven't even considered yet. Nevertheless, I'm very excited to effectively double the power output of this truck. 

I also believe I'm going to have to change the shifter to a mid-mount setup, on top of the transmission instead of the Challenger's extended linkage setup. The truck is a bit smaller than the Challenger and it looks to me like the current linkage will extend too far back, but I won't know for sure until I take some measurements when it arrives. There are a few companies that offer conversion kits, most of which also offer short shift options that I will definitely take advantage of, but I'm getting ahead of myself. 

That was an unexpected turn! Love it

Getting shifters to line up is such a fun game /s. I really didn't enjoy it in my swap project.

I met up with some friends the other night. There is a local group of enthusiasts that I hang out with occasionally and there's always an interesting variety of vehicles between us all. It was a small gathering this time, but the diverse selection did not disappoint. 

It's here! The delivery guy was a fellow car nerd who stood outside my garage for an hour to bullE36 M3 about my project and tell me about his various vehicles. That was a fun conversation. He was a big fan of the truck and didn't want to stop chatting, but he had another delivery to make. But anyway... on to the pictures!

Everything is intact from its trip across the country. It's in great shape and I can't wait to clean it up even more, bolt on some shiny new pieces, and drop it into the truck. 

I really, really need to get this new garage set up. I just moved in at the end of April and it's still mostly boxes. I have so much work ahead of me!