How do i make my mopar a daily driver??
Hello mopar guys!
I have a 360 in my 69 dart it was in an 84 D150 before. What do you think is the most important parts for making it a daily driver/make it more reliable? I was thinking about an EFI system, but which one? is there options to make a carburator just as reliable? I live in norway so i have very rough weather from time to time, from 14 F to 70 F temp weather in the summer..
The most important parts for a daily are quite honestly your brakes, tires, suspension, and then ignition and fuel systems. Safety is a big deal, and if your daily stops and handles like an average '60's or '70's car it won't last. People drive stupid, you have to be able to stop. If you're not running disks up front already you need them. Radial tires are a must, and it would be better to run a larger diameter rim (17" or 18") because you can get much better performing tires. Yes, BFG T/A's on 15's work, but if you're running a lot of miles you will experience their limitations. Larger torsion bars, better shocks and sway bars are a big consideration as well. You want your car to handle well. It doesn't have to be some full autoX set up, but you want to be at least in the ballpark with more modern cars. If you're wrestling your old car everywhere to compensate for poor handling and stopping you won't enjoy driving it. Some of that may be a little less important in Norway, I don't know how much traffic you have to deal with. Here if you want to hit the freeways on a regular basis you'd better be able to handle and stop pretty well if you want to stay in one piece.
Carburetors can be plenty reliable. I daily drove my '72 Challenger for about 70k miles with an edelbrock 600, and my current daily is my '74 Duster with a Holley 750 double pumper. Once you have a decent tune as far as fuel and ignition are concerned it shouldn't be a big deal. You do have a fairly large, and COLD, temperature range. Warming up the car is essential with a carb, and of course the tune that works best for 14° F will not be the same as the tune that works for 70° F, so you may need to have a "winter" and "summer" tune. Especially for a Holley. But there's no reason you can't run a carb on a daily. I am planning to go EFI at some point on my Duster though. EFI is super convenient, especially in cold weather the starting and warming things up can get annoying. The car will work just fine as long as you warm it up, but it is less convenient. I would run it for awhile with a carb and sort out the tuning first. Once that's done you can decide if you want to go EFI, you'll have a better idea of why you want it and your engine tune will be sorted out so the EFI install should go more smoothly.
If you want it more reliable for daily use , leave it alone . My question to you is : why ????? Why do you want to drive a 50 year old car every day ? to be cool or tobe cheap ? Neither option works very well . I drove a 1964 Dodge every day for a while and all I did was repair it . I spent almost every spare moment repairing or maintaining it . Unless EVERYTHING in the Dart is new prepare for repairs weekly AND keep up your membership in the auto club . You'll need it .
Complete bunch of crap. I've been daily driving a classic non-stop since 2008 now. And honestly I only had a new car for about a 4 year stretch right before that, from 1995-2004 I pretty much drove classics as daily's as well. I drive classics because that's what I like driving. I don't do it to "look cool", I don't care what other people think about it. And I don't do it to "be cheap", as I put plenty of money into my collection of classics and it honestly would be cheaper for me to have one new car instead of a fleet of classics. I just enjoy driving old cars.
I put 70k miles on my Challenger that I started daily driving in '08, and I've put over 20k miles on my Duster since it replaced my Challenger for daily driver duty. My Challenger never left me stranded anywhere.
Never. Yeah, I had to fix it a couple times that were inconvenient, but it was never towed home. My Duster has been towed home once, I lost a lash cap and bent a pushrod. I have co-workers with brand new cars that have been towed more than I have in the last 12 years. I drive around 10k miles a year most years, all in stuff older than 1974.
The initial stretch when you start first start driving a classic that hasn't been daily driven can be a little rough, you'll find all the stuff you either thought was ok or didn't think to replace. After a few months you won't need much of anything at all. I don't do maintenance weekly on my Duster, didn't do it on my Challenger either. Heck most of the time I don't do ANYTHING to them between oil changes. I check and tune when I change the oil, which is about every 3-4 months. So even monthly maintenance isn't necessary.
I somewhat agree with this. The guys at my orielys know my name. I'm in there all the time. Buying a 50yr old car no knowing the previous maintenance and upkeep done one it means everything needs replaced. My cooling system was trash, bushings trash, brakes barely worked, but she fires up with ease. I'm probably 2500 into parts tools and other odds and ends. Plus the countless hours spent working on it to try and make it as safe and reliable as possible
Yeah, but you're just starting with your car. That's how it goes for awhile when you first start daily driving a classic that hasn't been a daily driver. After a few months you'll have replaced most everything you needed to deal with, and the maintenance and repairs will slow down.
