Best Parts For A 1973 Dodge Dart 225 Slant Six Tune Up?

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Mike's Dart

Mike's Dart

Dodging The Negative Darting Toward The Positive
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McDermott, Ohio
I have not dropped by the local Dodge Dealership, but I am thinking they will not have any parts for my old 73 Dart. So plugs, air filter, oil filter, fuel filter and I'm thinking a rebuild kit for the single barrel Holley? What is the best quality parts to purchase? Thanks!

Mike
 
They don't require anything special at all. Go to an auto parts store and get what you need. Carb rebuild will do a lot. I just had a 225 rebuilt. It was a 65 with 35,000 miles on it so I put it in my daily 65 Dart. It runs like new and sounds great. My daily 225 had 180,000 miles on it so it was a great situation. Had to put a 318 in the donor.
 
Recently did my 225 Duster and picked up parts from Rock Auto- Great prices
 
I agree with Rockauto unless you want to shop locally. I prefer Standard ignition parts. I have had issues with the Ecklin brand from NAPA. BWD from Advanced is pretty good stuff too.
 
get a new distributor gear....they are plastic and will eventually fail. also buy 2 ballast resistors (it has electronic ignition right?) replace the current one and keep 2 spares in the glove box.
 
340duster340 said:
get a new distributor gear....they are plastic and will eventually fail. also buy 2 ballast resistors (it has electronic ignition right?) replace the current one and keep 2 spares in the glove box.
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Yes, electronic ignition! Thank you for the advice, will do exactly that!!

Mike
 
Mikes carb parts has fantastic quality rebuild kits.

Electronic ignition. I went the Ford Tfi module route driven by my points distributor with an accel high output coil. Car lights off easy no matter what now. EDIT. Didn't see you have the stock Mopar system.

ngk zfr5n extended tip plugs. Get rid of the crush washers on them.

Do yourself a favor and get new old stock made in USA caps and rotors from eBay.

after that was all done I went up 2 on the Main jets. Pulls much better wide open.
 
If your 73 still has the timing manipulating crap still on it, it needs to go. Keep the charcoal canister and assorted hoses and run one vacuum line from the carb to the distributor.

This would also be a good time to do the quick and easy fuel line mod.
 
340duster340 said:
get a new distributor gear....they are plastic and will eventually fail.
Click to expand...

One doesn't really follow from the other, but yeah, the distributor drive pinion can fail after a decade or three or four. See here.

also buy 2 ballast resistors
Click to expand...

…or do away with the damn thing completely and gain a bunch of other benefits by doing the HEI upgrade .

Also: Carburetor operation and repair manuals and links to training movies and carb repair/modification threads are posted here for free download, and also look at the Fuel line mod.

You will definitely want to bypass the OSAC valve on your '73. It is on the right (passenger) side of the firewall, with one hose running to the carb and one hose to the distributor. Just run vacuum hose directly from carb straight across and over the valve cover and down to the distributor. Your driveability will get MUCH better without creating new problems. It will get even better if you set the basic timing to about 3° to 5° BTDC instead of the 0 (TDC) setting. The late timing and OSAC valve were cheap and nasty desperation measures to squeak the '73s past the newly-tightened NOx emissions standards so they could be offered for first sale. Making these adjustments will put things more in line with the earlier, better-running cars.
 
slantsixdan said:
One doesn't really follow from the other, but yeah, the distributor drive pinion can fail after a decade or three or four. See here.



…or do away with the damn thing completely and gain a bunch of other benefits by doing the HEI upgrade .

Also: Carburetor operation and repair manuals and links to training movies and carb repair/modification threads are posted here for free download, and also look at the Fuel line mod.

You will definitely want to bypass the OSAC valve on your '73. It is on the right (passenger) side of the firewall, with one hose running to the carb and one hose to the distributor. Just run vacuum hose directly from carb straight across and over the valve cover and down to the distributor. Your driveability will get MUCH better without creating new problems. It will get even better if you set the basic timing to about 3° to 5° BTDC instead of the 0 (TDC) setting. The late timing and OSAC valve were cheap and nasty desperation measures to squeak the '73s past the newly-tightened NOx emissions standards so they could be offered for first sale. Making these adjustments will put things more in line with the earlier, better-running cars.
Click to expand...

The PO had already bypassed the OSAC valve! I wondered what that was all about! The old OSAC valve is still on the firewall. Just leave it there I guess? Car runs really good and seems to get better everyday I drive it! The horn has suddenly decided to work again? It is as if this old car just wanted to be driven again. It seems to be healing itself! Need to rebuild the carb next weekend, do plugs, fuel filter and air filter with a valve adjustment just to be sure they are ok! I have not been this thrilled about any automobile in many, many years!! Thanks so much for passing on your "Dart" knowledge!!

Mike
 
If you have a Holley 1920, search for info on blowing out the sealed metering block. One guy says he does this. Otherwise, a rebuild may not fix a lean idle. I got a low-cost kit of cap-rotor-plug wires at rockauto a few years ago. But read SlantSixDan's discussion of poorly-made distributor caps. Wise to run a dedicated ground wire to the case of your ECU box since bad grounds are a common problem. Someday you could retrofit to an HEI module for a slight spark improvement.
 
For tune up parts on older vehicles, I hawk Ebay for NOS stuff. Echlin, Belden, Standard and the like. The old stuff was quality and made in USA. Things like plastic rubbing blocks on ignition points now are nowhere near the quality as 30 or 40 years ago. Same with all the other parts. I would rather have an NOS set of Standard Ignition plug wires than anything any of the big box stores sells now. All you have to do is look at a Wells distributor cap from Autozone and compare it to a Standard Blue Streak of days gone by. You could beat somebody's brains out with a Blue Streak cap. They are that thick and heavy. Pretty much everything you can get now is junk.
 
RockAuto has good selection and prices, but be aware that they won't accept returns for any reason (even defective or missing parts) after 30 days. Check your stuff when it arrives.
 
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