The Dust-Turd project.
Decided to post the saga of the 70 Duster project I have started. A little background, Found the car for sale on a Mopar facebook group. 1970 Duster 340 4 speed drag car converted to a street car, 452 Ray Barton 400 stroker 10.5 to 1, Stage 6 ported heads, M-1 intake, 750 Holley, a 727 and narrowed Strange Dana 60. Owner was unsure of the details of the car as he bought it in its current form. Would only accept cash on the pretence of tax reason. Flew up to Indy and checked it out, but no test drive as it was raining all day. Bought the car cash and paid an additional $400.00 to have the seller replace the mufflers with some stainless Flowmasters. (He owned a muffler shop).
Car was picked up 2 weeks later and delivered. Seller did not install the mufflers as he didn't have time and put them in the car. They were not the stainless, but the standard $99.00 outlaw mufflers. 400.00 for 200.00 worth of parts? Oh well.
Unloaded the car from the transport, ran it up to the shop and put it on the lift for a quick check up. Looked ok so we took it for a drive. Ran good, tracked correctly and stopped. full 2x3 frame and cage, tubbed with coil overs / ladder bar rear, Strange rear discs, Pinto rack and Mustang II control arms and GM disk on the front. Good starting point. Back to the house to fix the shifter ( Installed backwards) and then a short test drive. 1 mile out while cruising along at 2500 RPM it started popping back thru the carb. Killed the motor and called a wrecker.
Found the #6 EX pushrod broke the cup off the end. Found the cup and pulled the rockers. Yikes! Crane gold Race 1.5 rockers were all out of adjustment and some had the ball of the adjuster bottomed out in the rocker. Cups on the PR hitting the rocker body and the rocker also hitting the retainer on the other side. (looks like it had several valve train related failures in the past)
PR were stock length B block 8.565 Crower 0.80 (13) with 3 stock Mopar 8.65s. Noticed something under the valley plate, pulled the intake and found some cardboard in the lifter valley.
Safe to say someone with no business touching anything mechanical was fighting out of their weight class in this case.
Called Ray Barton and he said the motor would not use stock length PRs. I ordered a set of Harland Sharp rockers to replace the beat up Cranes and are waiting for them to be made and delivered. I can then get an exact measurement, check the valvetrain geometry and order some new PRs. Hurry up and wait.
Decided to post the saga of the 70 Duster project I have started. A little background, Found the car for sale on a Mopar facebook group. 1970 Duster 340 4 speed drag car converted to a street car, 452 Ray Barton 400 stroker 10.5 to 1, Stage 6 ported heads, M-1 intake, 750 Holley, a 727 and narrowed Strange Dana 60. Owner was unsure of the details of the car as he bought it in its current form. Would only accept cash on the pretence of tax reason. Flew up to Indy and checked it out, but no test drive as it was raining all day. Bought the car cash and paid an additional $400.00 to have the seller replace the mufflers with some stainless Flowmasters. (He owned a muffler shop).
Car was picked up 2 weeks later and delivered. Seller did not install the mufflers as he didn't have time and put them in the car. They were not the stainless, but the standard $99.00 outlaw mufflers. 400.00 for 200.00 worth of parts? Oh well.
Unloaded the car from the transport, ran it up to the shop and put it on the lift for a quick check up. Looked ok so we took it for a drive. Ran good, tracked correctly and stopped. full 2x3 frame and cage, tubbed with coil overs / ladder bar rear, Strange rear discs, Pinto rack and Mustang II control arms and GM disk on the front. Good starting point. Back to the house to fix the shifter ( Installed backwards) and then a short test drive. 1 mile out while cruising along at 2500 RPM it started popping back thru the carb. Killed the motor and called a wrecker.
Found the #6 EX pushrod broke the cup off the end. Found the cup and pulled the rockers. Yikes! Crane gold Race 1.5 rockers were all out of adjustment and some had the ball of the adjuster bottomed out in the rocker. Cups on the PR hitting the rocker body and the rocker also hitting the retainer on the other side. (looks like it had several valve train related failures in the past)
PR were stock length B block 8.565 Crower 0.80 (13) with 3 stock Mopar 8.65s. Noticed something under the valley plate, pulled the intake and found some cardboard in the lifter valley.
Safe to say someone with no business touching anything mechanical was fighting out of their weight class in this case.
Called Ray Barton and he said the motor would not use stock length PRs. I ordered a set of Harland Sharp rockers to replace the beat up Cranes and are waiting for them to be made and delivered. I can then get an exact measurement, check the valvetrain geometry and order some new PRs. Hurry up and wait.
