She's finally purple again! FC7 70 Shaker Cuda340

[njsteve]

Those are too modern. I'm looking for the vintage old version like this but with the Direct Connection logo instead.

[MoparCarGuy]

No such animal. The only Direct Connection valve covers (stamped with Direct Connection) were the chromed steel and the blue-anodized aluminum. DC was renamed Mopar Performance in 1987 and the cast aluminum like your picture were introduced after that.

[njsteve]

Yup, just another hallucination from my youth. ;-)

[njsteve]

I sent off the original, Prestolite cast iron #3438317 distributor to Joe White who previously restored it for the prior owner of this project, Dave.

Although it was already setup with the original dual points and ready to go, I wanted it upgraded to the Pertronix electronic ignition setup before I installed it. Dave had already put in a generic single point distributor that he converted with a Pertronix system when he was trouble shooting the original non-start problem (that turned out to be the defective ignition switch). That's why the dual point was in a box when the car project initially arrived. Unfortunately the Pertronix unit he used is not the same one for the dual point applications.

Joe White's specialty is restoring old distributors and upgrading them if requested. He also reverified the ignition advance curve and set it at 18 degrees at 3,600 rpm. Check out his facebook site for prior restoration photo at "Joes Mopar Distributor Restorations." He also does vintage aftermarket distributors and other makes as well.

I installed a recently acquired Pertronix 40,000 volt, 1.5 ohm coil, and I'm using the "deballasted" ballast resistor that Dave converted with a section of 10 gauge wire, as the Pertronix needs full voltage to run optimally.

The distributor should be back here and installed next week. (fingers crossed).

[njsteve]

Joe is all done and ready to ship out after doing some extra detailing on the unit.

[njsteve]

I spent an hour or so trying to finagle with the 1970's FM converter that I installed. It does work ok and gets the local FM stations but since the factory AM radio only puts out 2 watts, it wont power the speakers with any degree of volume that you can actually hear when the car is running. I even disconnected the fader switch and wired the dash speaker directly to the two speaker leads coming out of the radio itself, with no improvement.

So I am on the hunt for a vintage 25 or 40 watt underdash amp to get some sound output. There are several on ebay - like the vintage Audiovox Sound Exploder AMP500-D. I've seen several on Ebay (that's where I got the two photos below), unless someone here has some old sound equipment lying around.

[njsteve]

I spent an hour installing the black plastic mudflaps from my old 70 Charger just to protect the paint. That was after I spent four hours using a clay bar and then waxing the car for the first time. It's probably been 43 years since the last time it was waxed (or even on the road, for that matter)

I took the Cuda out for a drive today, down to my buddy's shop. The old car drives very nicely. Tracks straight as an arrow down the road, so I guess my attempt at doing the alignment myself actually worked!

When rolling you don't even notice that is has manual steering. It's actually nice and tight with actual road feel compared to how a normal Mopar with power steering feels. And the manual drums aren't that bad either.

If I could get some decent tunes on the radio, I'd be all set.

[anlauto]

Great to see the car back on the road with a great amount of satisfaction knowing you did most of the work yourself 

[njsteve]

Thanks!

Update: I found a vintage NOS Audiovox Sound Exploder amp. The guy wanted $80, I offered him $35 and he accepted. I mentioned that the two prior NOS units sold within the past month for $23 and $25 plus shipping, so he agreed $35 including shipping was a reasonable offer.

[Brads70]

Car looks great! Nice job! 

[Dakota]

Congrats on getting your car back on the road!   It's a great feeling.

[njsteve]

I got the updated original Prestolite cast iron dual point (now with Pertronix) installed and she started right up. I set the timing and then adjusted the idle mixture. That took a little thinking since the carb only has a vacuum port for the distributor's ported vacuum and the car has manual brakes, so no manifold fitting either. I ended up pulling the pipe plug from the intake and installing a GM vacuum fitting (I think it's from a GM?) and routed the vacuum gauge to that so I could see what the highest reading was while adjusting mixture. I got it up to 19 inches of vaccum at 1500 rpm. I then set the idle back down to the factory 900 rpm. I think I'll leave the fitting there for the moment with a rubber cap on it, in case I need to readjust the mixture again in the near future.

[ledphoot]

What a sweet ride... Purple really works on Cudas.

[njsteve]

Thanks! I always wanted a purple cuda but always managed to trip over every other color but FC7 in the past four decades of searching. Finally found this one last year. It's a lot of fun to have a happy little smallblock car instead of all those angry big blocks and hemis.  :-)

[njsteve]

Well, plans for the audio system sort of evolved. I received the NOS Audiovox Amp but one channel wasn't working - so much for 50 year-old electronic equipment. Even with the one channel hooked up, it only raised the output volume by maybe 50% - still too quiet, and since it was plumbed through the original AM, it stilll sounded crackly.

So I went through my boxes of "crap I never threw out from the past-half century" and found the original no-name, K-Mart AM/FM Cassette deck that I had in my 70 Superbird that I drove to high school. Yeah, vintage 1979 or so. So I threw that in the car and hooked up the speakers.

YEAH BABY!

It sounds great. I then went and found my old stash of cassettes and located my favorite Bob Seger and The Silver Bullet Band cassettes from the same era.

Sure brings back memories from driving out to the Street Machine Nats in '79, '80 and '81. I had that cassette running in a constant tape loop for the the entire trips. Nothing like hearing "Turn The Page" cruising down I-80, watching the sunrise.