'68 Dart with a 318 LA - Build Options

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@KCBones

You will have to put an oil pressure gauge on the 318 to see where your oil pressure is running. Good pressure equals good bearing tolerances.

If you can get an eye shot on the cam peaks, that is a good sign to what condition the engine is in. Hopefully they have not degraded.

Can look in through the distributor hole if you are not tearing the engine down. See what the cam wear pattern looks like.
 
toolmanmike said:
That's a pretty car! I have a LD4B and a 650 AVS2 to add to my 70 teen. I already have duals. It runs so nice now I hate to mess with it.
Click to expand...
I'm in the same boat- the teener in my Swinger is such a nice runner now, I can't see the point in swapping in the E58 360 I've got tucked away under the bench. Maybe someday.
 
The factory said dual exhaust was worth 20 HP.

That's without headers.

...and that's a relatively easy mod and easy to find a local place to do it.

No decrease in MPG, either.
 
Love the '68 & '69 318s.

Don't throw the baby out with the bath water.

There is Gold in them thar hills.

IMG952017011295175305873.jpg


Who would have thought? ...

☆☆☆☆☆
 
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^^ yep nothing wrong with rebuilding a 318
Just fork out for decent pistons to get the compression ratio up.
 
...unless it's already aa 9.2:1 67-69 or LA roller, or a Magnum.

...or unless you need 10:1.
 
One thing I ran into with the 302 heads was the air injection on the #7 cylinder hitting the exhaust manifold. I rebuilt a 1987 318 for my ‘65 barracuda thinking it was a direct bolt in. When I started it I realized that the air injection boss was hitting the exhaust manifold where it returned towards the head to clear the steering shaft. I got it ground down to clear finally. You need to make sure you use the correct exhaust gaskets being the ones for the 302 heads have a larger opening than the nonsmog gaskets do. The larger opening creates a exhaust leak when you grind away the air injection boss that would normally back the gasket when the exh. manifold bolts up. That was the only hang up I encountered.
I bored the motor .030 over, put in flat top pistons reversed, a mild summit racing cam, Edelbrock performer intake and a Edelbrock 650 carburetor. I’m still running the dual point distributor. It has plenty of power and runs great.
 
Juse use the performer intake and holley carb. My teen ran better with th performer than the d4b. Rering and all new bearing if bores are good. Otherwise bore with new Pistons. Summit sells a 340 repo cam that's cheap and will work fine. That with headers and gasket matched and bowl blend 302s will be a stout 318. And use Mr. G .028 gaskets.
 
Thanks everybody for their input. At this point I'm just leaning towards a refresh of the 318 with very simple and inexpensive upgrades, a refresh of the existing 904 tranny, and maybe an upgrade of the rear end if I can find something affordable like an a-body 8-1/4. I'm getting ready to get the Dart up off the ground and leveled up for some front frame rail repairs so the engine and K-frame will likely be coming out soon. I'll find out then if a refresh of the 318 and the 904 is the best route to take. I'll definitely be doing a complete front suspension rebuild at that time too.
 
If you haven't already pulled the engine, a compression test and a leakdown test is a good idea.
 
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