2nd Car Show..SUCCESS

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Joep

Joep

Well-Known Member
Joined
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Vermont
Ok guys, yesterday was the 11th annual Better Late Than Never car show close to my home town and this year.. I finally got to drive it there!! Two years ago, my Uncle Mark passed away unexpectedly, and one of his last wishes were to my grandfather "Worst case scenario I want Joe to get the car." And sadly he passed not longer after that. The car is a 1971 Dodge Demon built to race. The engine is a 68 440 block bored out .030 over with forged speed pro pistons, stock rods and steel crank, crower cam, crane ignition, 10 gallon fuel cell with a holley blue pump pushing fuel down 1/2" line, right now it only has a 600 cfm holley carb for fuel economy of course, torker intake, 727 torque flight with turbo action reverse manual valve body transmission, TCI 10" converter and the 8 3/4 rear end with 3.91 gears. It mostly was a drag car but it was also on the road a little bit. I didn't know a whole lot about muscle cars like this but I wanted to learn. When I first got it, it would overheat. So I really couldn't drive it because 1 it wouldn't cool and 2 it wasn't inspected since 2004. Heres a picture of when I first got her

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Meanwhile my good friend Eric was telling me he had to paint something on the hood. So after many drawings and trying to figure out what we should do and what it would look like, we came up with this.

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So after about a year of trying to figure out how to get the girl to stay cool, I couldn't figure it out. Which means if I wanted to take it to the car show it had to be towed by a good friend. Made it to the car show with open headers making a lot of noise and turning lots of heads.

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Winter came and my friend Eric that painted my hood also works at an upholstery shop. He by one day and I told him my plans to put in interior, nothing special just the normal panels and such. He looked at me and said "dude, do you realize I do this for a living!? We can do whatever you want and it will be really cheap!" So after thinking about it I said why not, I can build it however I want, so thats what we did. After spending many long and very cold winter nights out in the garage and gather supplies and materials and brainstorming (the smoke from the wood stove wasn't always from the fire. Our heads were working hard..) We finally came up with a plan and we just went for it. Neither one of us knew what we were doing and have never done anything like this before but we just went with it. This is how it went.

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Working around a roll cage sure made it interesting and painful.

So spring rolls around and it's time for baseball season! After numerous attempts to solve the over heating problem I finally thought I had figured it out just in time for prom. That morning I got up real early to shine the old girl up and take her down to get inspected before my baseball game. Pulled out of the driveway and was feeling good about it all. Until I got about half way there. The temp gauge wouldn't stop climbing...:( So I pulled over at the closest gas station and shut her off to let her cool off, went in bought some water because i knew just what would happen. I walked back out to see ANOTHER puddle of coolant on the ground. So I called my girlfriend and she gave me a ride to the game and her dad who owns a shop picked it up later and tried to bring it to his shop. It didn't make it there before hitting 250. So after the game I headed home to get all cleaned up and looking sharp I headed out to her house. Of course as all women are she wasn't ready so I headed down the road and picked the car up and brought it back to her house a parked it. After a slipping trans and puking coolant, it was done for the day. We managed to get a few pictures with it which made it all worthwhile for me. My 2nd attempt at taking her to prom was shot down again!! A couple days later, I picked it up at their house on my way to the vocational center to the auto shop I went to and it barely made it there but it did without puking.

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I did a pressure test, flushed the system and bled the system, but still....It wouldn't stay cool, even with no stat in it. I couldn't leave it there forever so the weekend came and we tried to bring it 20 minutes home. You can only imagine how that went...

5 miles Stop #1

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5 More Miles Stop #2
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Then we just said screw it
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After a tow she finally made it home. While all this is happening the car really does not want to go anywhere. She wouldn't move unless you just about floored it. So something wasn't right. After much frustration it pushing it out of the garage to run it so i didn't kill myself breathing in exhaust, I could never get it back in! It wouldn't move! And it's so heavy to push over the lip of the garage! After a lot of frustrating moments of saying why won't you move!! I finally realized the tranny fluid was very low and was foaming up the stick to make it look like it was full. Fixing that was a HUGE sigh of relief. Not knowing what else to about cooling it without shelling a bunch of money on new parts, that's exactly what I did. 2 batteries, 1 alternator and 1 water pump. The water pump didn't fix the problem by itself. So that meant to spend some more. 1 brand spankin new 26 inch 3 row aluminum champion radiator with 2 fans and a shroud later. This was my last chance at tackling the cooling system. If this didn't solve it then that meant to pull the engine and rebuild it. Of course with a massive radiator and an a body, they don't go together easy. So I called up my buddy Eric and he came down with the hot rodding genius Brad Vincent (Eric's girlfriends dad) who has built tons of cars and the came down to help. Here we are cutting the lower rad support just to get the thing to fit

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Don't mind the caption, that would be Eric's girlfriend for ya. We finally got it to fit ok. After finally finding time to actually bolt the radiator in and mounting and wiring the fans and shroud it's time to fire it up. It cooled!! Well for a few days. Then it started to get warm out again and guess what..it wouldn't stay cool! At this point I didn't know what else to do, the whole cooling system was brand spanking new and it still wouldn't stay cool. After trying and trying to flush the system out as best that I could. I knew there was only one more thing that I could try and that was to put the belt driven fan back on instead of the 2 electrics. So I pulled the radiator out and bolted on the flex fan again and set the radiator back in, also swapping out the cheap thermostat for a stint 195 in the process. I went for a drive. AND WHAT DO YOU KNOW!! IT DOESN'T OVERHEAT!!!!! But just to make sure I brought it right to Brads house to have him look at it. He said that problem is solved! When I heard that I felt so good.:cheers:After two whole years of trying to get the thing to cool, I finally got it. And just in time for this years car show!! So finding someone to inspect it and two ball joints later (napa gave me the wrong one) I got a sticker FINALLY

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That was a great feeling! Now to get home and get her all cleaned up for the show. I brought my girl home with me and we washed, vacuumed and cleaned every nook and crany of that car and made it look purty. And I have to say thank you to my girlfriend for putting on the finishing touch. The decal my mom made for me 2 years ago for my birthday.

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It's car show day!! It's amazing what can happen in only one year.
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And I also made a fan! He said this was his favorite car out of all 214 cars that were there!! He's got good taste!


Now it's time to just drive the old girl like she was meant to be driven. My uncle Mark always hated to see beautiful cars never be driven, so that's exactly what i'm gonna do. DRIVE IT! I have to thank all of the people that helped me on this forum I never would have been able to do it without you guys and Iv'e learned so much. Also thanks to Eric. He has had his hand in this car just about as much as I have and it wouldn't look the way it does now without him.

I Hope You're Proud Uncle Mark!
 
Wow!! Beautiful car!!! Love the interior y'all put in it, Especially the headliner!!! I'm sure your uncle would be proud!!!
 
Uncle Mark is smiling down on you and his car, for sure!!! Nice work!!

Persistence pays off...in both cars and women, lol


!!
 
Cool! Now I know who to ask for parts:burnout:
 
There was a blessing in the gift from your uncle

Give a young man the opportunity to learn life skills, might have helped had he been there to assist but it worked out. CONGRADULATIONS in getting it roadworthy!

Your interior is cool

I also have had a cooling issue with my Dart. Have a becool radiator, changed electric fan, thermostat, pulleys. I think you and Tony Fields have something going on with removing the electric and going back to mechanical. Might be my next attempt to cool my car better.
 
A lean motor is a hot motor and a 600cfm isnt enough for a 440. But glad you got it working right now.
 
Yes I would definitely recommend putting on your mechanical fan. My flex fan throws heat so much better than the two little electrics.

Also I do have a 850 dp i just rebuilt that I am going to put on at some point. Don't know when but it will happen!
 
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