Durable, Streetable, Economic 318

In 1998 & 1999 in my spare time I built a very simple but effective 318. I went to Pick & Pull and pulled a 1973 318 out of a famed 1973 Plymouth Valiant 4 door, a Howerd Stearn car, hey the spark plugs looked good. I had to pay 99.00 for it. I stripped it down and checked the crank clearance, the end play was a little much but I figured good bearings would tighten things up.
I simply had the block tanked and bored, new cam bearings installed, and distributor driveshaft sleeve installed. And the crank turned 10/10. I had a simple 3 angle valve job done on the heads and installed the orange Mopar Performance springs in them.
I used a deluxe engine rebuild kit from P.A.W. 30 over pistons included. I bought a Comp 270H .470/.470 Magnum camshaft.
I used a 340 Torker intake, MoPar Performance orange box conversion kit as the engine was going into a early A body. I bought a new 625 Competition Carter. A 1900 to 2100 stall on a 1200. dollar built 998 transmission. I left the little 7 &1/4 inch rearend it the car and even ran a solid flex fan and stock 318 exhaust manifolds, sealed nice. I did have performance exhaust pipes and dynomax ultra flos on it out the back.
This engine in long block form was cheaper than the transmission and ran hard and fast with second gear chirps. And get this that built transmission was the first to go out. I put 35,000 on it and like I said hard miles, the trans went out and I sold the engine for 650. in long block form which was installed right away into a 68 Dart. The rearend was stock and still working when I upgraded it for my newest power plant.
The reason why I chose 1973 318 is it was the first year of unleaded only fuels.
The car ran consistent 12.50 1/4 miles, a little 65 Barracuda. Not bad at all for a little engine that could. I pulled into a fuel station in Carson City Nevada to fuel up one day out driving and a guy comes up and said wow! that sounds awesome what does it have a 383, nice!:thumbup: