What did you do with your ebody/Mopar today?

[dodj]

Went out for a shake down, dude says, Hey, is that a Maverick!

[jimynick]

Spent this afternoon degreeing in my cam and it was educational, I can tell you! Thankfully, it appears that Lunati know what they're doing (LOL) and my fumbling calculations actually matched up with the cam card, hurray! Dug out a distributor and the new pushrods for the hydraulic roller lifters that're also going to go in asap. Step by halting step.......

[MurderFish73440]

Put the new hood on. I think it lined up ok. What's the best way to get this double sided tape residue off? I was thinking denatured alcohol.

I need the vent inserts now. I didn't realize they didn't come with.  they are not cheap either.

[blown motor]

Products like goo gone and goof off will remove the  glue residue. Brake cleaner might also do it.

[Cudajason]

Put the new hood on. I think it lined up ok. What's the best way to get this double sided tape residue off? I was thinking denatured alcohol.

I need the vent inserts now. I didn't realize they didn't come with.  they are not cheap either.

@MurderFish73440  do the inserts need to be new?  I have a set laying around that I could part with.

[MurderFish73440]

How much are you asking? got pics?

[jimynick]

I thought today would be a good day to get the timing cover on, so I gathered all the various lengthened bolts for it, teflon tape/liquid thread sealant'd them, Right Stuffed the gasket and set it on. Humph, seems ok, so I put in a couple of bolts and thought I'd best slide on the new BHJ balancer that I had for it. The balancer went on the crank snout pretty good.... for about an inch, and there she stopped. WTH? I got a deadblow hammer and gave 'er a couple of love taps- nada, then perhaps a wee piece of 2X4 and a nice 4lb BFH, but no, Not wanting to beat on the balancer and with the Right Stuff ticking, I was faced with the reality that the balancer AND cover had to come off to sort out this PITA. Dig out a puller, pull it, unbolt and pull it off and then with a razor blade, scrape the RS off both the block and the case gasket while managing to get it everywhere.  Feeling inside the balancer, it seemed that there was a slight, ridge-like difference in size. WHA? Called BHJ and Chris their tech, listened as I laid out my tale of woe; "Oh, didn't you know that the balancer is a squeeze fit and that the balancer is about 1-2 thou smaller than the crank?" NO, I didn't know, but I do now! Ole Chris suggested putting the balancer in the oven to warm/expand it somewhat and I imagine that my wife's friends will laugh for manys the day about me "cooking" a car part in her oven. God help me. So, I then went out to Princess Auto in search of a balancer installation tool and bought the only thing they had, but which I didn't think would work. Take it home, unwrap it and no, it won't work. My crank (and likely yours too) has a 3/4NF thread and these were all smaller and metric, just to rub salt in the wound. What to do now? Fevered searching on Amazon, but no, too long to get. Then I had a brain wave and drove over to Don Mosher's engine repair shop where he very kindly loaned me his Blue Point set and I returned home, got it nice and covered with the RS again, and re-mounted the timing cover, fetched the balancer from the oven, to calls asking if it "was done yet" from the peanut gallery and carried the hot balancer out, greased it (that was fun with a 175'F part, and shoved it on the crank, configured the installer and had to dig out what we call the "Clue Wrench"(game of Clue possible murder weapon) since I didn't have a 1 1/4' wrench, and cranked that SOB on with only having to jam the crank to finish it, once. Oh, what fun!! I gotta get a drink just telling this fiasco. 

[blown motor]

I love following your progress. You have a great way of telling it.

[Dakota]

I love following your progress. You have a great way of telling it.

  when I see a post from jimmynick on this thread, I know it's going to be "story time".   There will be tools, there will be flying parts, there will be long strings of muttered curse words, finished with an expressed need for drink.   

[blown motor]

I love following your progress. You have a great way of telling it.

  when I see a post from jimmynick on this thread, I know it's going to be "story time".   There will be tools, there will be flying parts, there will be long strings of muttered curse words, finished with an expressed need for drink.   

You forgot to mention that he will have to go somewhere. 

[jimynick]

"You forgot to mention that he will have to go somewhere. "  Yes, you're right. Today, I headed out and returned my borrowed harmonic balancer installer to Don Mosher, however he wasn't in the shop, so I stuck a 10 spot in the box and gave it to one of his minions. Then I thought (I really should leave that to the horses, as they have bigger heads) that I'd put the "platinum" oil pan on, (buy a pan from Milodon lately?) and thought that here was a chance to use one of the one-piece pan gaskets that I scored somewhere. It all seemed like a no-brainer ( I know) but when I try-fitted it on the block with the pan, the rear seal lip of the pan has a groove stamped into it facing down into the crankcase, and the gasket has a narrow 1/8th"+) 3 ribbed band that goes over the rear main cap pointing up and the narrow seal isn't really happy trying to find an area on that ridge, to seal. Jesus, what next?! So, I call Milodon and my pal Tom there, tells me that yeah, they know, but there is no other pan that they make for a 360 and their best technical advice was to just goop it up really good! Huh?! SO, I got out the tube of Right Stuff and gave 'er a right good goopin'! I gooped 'er high and I gooped' er low and then slithered the pan on and slapped in my new pan bolts. You may imagine my surprise, when I realized that I'd put a bolt in every hole- and still had 2 left?! WTF? Seeing as how my brain is slowly turning to mush, I recounted, twice more and yep, I've got 2 nice, new bolts left over. Don't ask, 'cause I don't know. The one piece gasket has those nice steel rings that reduce the possibility of over torquing the pan and I went over the bolts 3 times to try to get things tightened down properly and then I took a gloved finger and schmeered the out-squishings smooth and touched up any spots that had the slightest indication that the SOB's might leak. God help me if I ever have to remove that pan! I figure that at this rate, it'll only take about 236 days to build this motor, and then, Murray said he wanted to be there for the initial fire up! I asked him if he just wanted to come over and see how bad it rattles or leaks! LOL AND, wise guys, no drinkin'! booze that is, but the weather's turned cold again and the case of water outside the door is again, harder than Chinese arithmetic!  Are we havin' fun yet? 

[jimynick]

Trying to maintain some momentum, I checked my Right Stuff gooping job today and it seems not bad. I thought it was time, so I rolled the engine over and installed the new lifters, tie bars and the spider. I couldn't find a torque spec for the spider bolts and reverted to the old Bruce County "nice 'en tight, good and snug" with a few drops of blue Loctite to boot. Then, as recommended elsewhere, I figured to test fit the heads and make sure they fit over the dowels ok, and they do, so I set the intake on them and tried to see if all the holes are lining up. They weren't bad, but I figured I should have the head gaskets on to simulate the right height. I went up to my "parts department" and retrieved 2 of the Fel Pro 1008 head gaskets I have for it. I'm sure it comes as no surprise to many, that the price of these gaskets, recommend for the aluminum head/iron block combo, is stupid, with one local supplier quoting me $120- for one! Handling them like they were Lalique- made I slipped the first one over the studs and it seemed to be perfect, all the holes lined up, yea! Then I went over to the drivers side of the block and tried to put that one on, face/lettering up like the first one. Hmmm there seems to be a problem with the gasket fitting flush to the block, oh wait! The dowels don't have a hole made for them in the gasket. WTF?! Taking it off, I noticed that there is only one place for the dowels to go- and they're not in the place the gasket wants them to be. Yikes! After eyeballing it, I flipped the gasket end for end and over and lo and behold, the damn thing fits perf! However, the pattern of the fire rings is slightly different looking up, now. Dead God! I headed over to my friend Harold at Engines from Hal in Guelph and he assured me that yes, it was asinine, but not all that uncommon and he showed me a Ford head gasket that had "front" marked on it and required the same flipping as mine seemed to need. So, I came home in a better frame of mind than when I'd left and with any luck, tomorrow I may get the heads on this thing. We'll see.   

[usraptor]

I've been wanting to do this forever for two reasons.  Even though I did the RTE (I think that's it but it so long ago I may very well be wrong) electronic tach upgrade kit, I've never felt like I got the Rallye Dash Tach properly calibrated and it just seems to react slow to the engine RPM, and two I wanted an old school look.  So I purchased this Mopar brand Tach from Summit Racing, mounted and hooked up today.  Love the look. 

[jimynick]

Pretty doggy day. I took some 320 grit sandpaper and scuffed all and any marks off of the deck surface of the aluminum heads, so that I hopefully will have no issues with my high dollar head gaskets and I actually got them on after checking that the studs were all bottomed, and then took ARP's moly and lubed all the nuts and washers and got them on and torqued to the second stage of 90 lb/ft with the final 110 yet to go. I had the torque wrench in my hand, when the inter house phone rang and my bride informed me that son Jim, wife Emily and best of all, grandaughter Lillian were here, so the old Challenger's engine got put on hold for some grampa snuggles with Lilly. Tomorrow's another day! 

[Cudajason]

How much are you asking? got pics?

@MurderFish73440 here are some pics. I have all four pieces, the liners are a bit beat up but useable.

I would take 100 bucks plus shipping.