73 dart rebuild advice please

[Lazares81]

i have a 73 dart swinger with a 318 in it right now, i want to pull the block, and rebuild the drive train, would like to stay automatic. any advice on a powerful setup, but i am going drive this car on the street not the track, no smog laws tho it is except in CA i have the money to rebuild the motor now, the rest will need to wait for a couple months

 

[70aarcuda]

are we totally rebuilding the engine...bore/hone..new pistons...valve job?

do you have headers?...aluminum intake? 4 barrel carb?

 

[duster731]

I just got done rebuilding my 318 for a 73 duster and beefed up the engine meaning bigger cam, intake, headers, 650 carb.. another good add on is casting # 302 swirl port heads with the bigger valves 1.80 int 1.66 ex I think those are a great addition which is what I'm doing later. I got a 904 trans (which is the three speed automatic that you have) I put a shift kit in it a deep pan and lower gears and get a 8 3/4 rear end sure grip with 355 gears or something like that... all of this is a pretty good set up for street performance

 

[Lazares81]

to 70aarcuda, no i dont have anything yet. literally bought the car a month ago and all i have done is wash it a couple times put a battery, plugs and wires in it to get it running. Yes we are talking a complete rebuild. im planning on pulling the block and doing a complete overhaul. any advice you can give would be greatly appreciated im looking to be pushing around 400 horses good amount of torque for those light to light races, but this will be my street rod driven mostly to and from work when i get the impulse and on the weekends

to duster, thank you for the info, will that tranny be able to handle the power when im done? or am i going to need to rebuild it with better parts? as for the rear end any suggestions on what came with an 8 3/4 stock so i can start searching for one? also is it possible to find a rear end like that with disc brakes? i want to convert to disc all the way around

 

[Lazares81]

also just a thought if i am going to be going through this whole process anyways would i be better off sticking with the 318 i have now or putting a 340 or 360 in it? also is it possible to turn my 318 into a 400 ? would it be better to do that or turn it into a stroker?

 

[70aarcuda]

you can stroke a 318 to 390....

needs 4 inch stroke crank and new pistons to accomdate the stroke...

also...you will need better heads then the 318 heads to feed 390 inches..

 

[duster731]

Well for the rear end there is a couple of gear ratio,s u can put in your self and you can also get disc brake conversion from summitracing for around 400. The tranny can take 300 to 400 maybe more I no a built tranny from bob mazzolini racing here in riverside has been behind a 360 pushing 600 horses around 1000$ and people say drop the 318 and get a 360 but I like to be different and beef the 318 up it can push around 400 horses just by getting a right set up and a lot of machine work Google 318 build up there's an article from mopar muscle magazine and they got a 318 to 400 horses

 

[Lazares81]

thanks for the info, my buddy at a machine shop happens to have a 318 short block he rebuilt for a customer that never showed up for the pickup, so he wants to sell it, im going to check it out tomorrow.
basically if you could, and had a comfortable amount of coin to do it all with, what setup would you run with the 318? keep in mind this will get driven consistently

 

[Lazares81]

turns out the 318 he had was a stock rebuild, nothing special. so im back to square one, if im going to spend this much money i might as well splurge for the 360 so i have the expandability down the line?