'74 440 Dart

[No rush]

Hi everyone,
My name is Max Iam 24 years old and I live Australia. Been a member of for a body's only for a while now but don't post much. Thought it was about time I make a little build thread to hopefully get peoples opinions and ideas. I bought a 1974 dodge dart back in 2011, it had a pretty standard 440 bb with a 727 and 8 1/4 diff. Here is how it looked when I went and inspected it.




It took a few months to get it back to my state as it's was on the other side of the country, but the day I picked it up was a awesome day.

 

[No rush]

Once i had it for a few months I decided to try and tidy it up a bit and make it my own. I was still and apprentice back then so it was nothing crazy. I removed the old carby and put on a holly 750, removed the mallory ignition and replaced it with a msd 6al2, new maga fuel pump and reg, replaced the water pump with a electric one and just a few other dress up things.

 

[No rush]

After changing those few things it was time to have a bit of fun in the car and I took it to a car show. Was a really fun weekend but ended up breaking a bit of the front suspension and come to the realisation that the car needed more power and to handle a lot better.

 

[No rush]

After the fun of the weekend had past I decided to let the car sit for a good few months while I come up with a plan. By this stage I was a tradesman and I was about mid way through 2012. I had decided to get a bit more serious with the car and ordered a new sheet metal 9", some 15x12 pro star rims and a engine plate.







I took the car up to a local fabrication shop and they mini tubbed the car, got the diff to suit the new rims, installed some chassis connectors and mounted the engine to the new engine plate.
The diff ended up with 35 spline Moser axels and a full spool strange centre 3.25:1*gears. I went with some wilwood brakes.

 

[No rush]

With the back half of the car under way it was time to start on the front. I decided to remove the old steering rack, k-frame, tousion bars and drum brakes. I ordered and fitted a alterKation kit over a weekend with my mates and it freed up a lot of extra space and looked a lot nicer, should make a big improvement.












Took another few months off working on the car in till a second hand 440 stroker come up for sale. The only problem was it was on the other side of Australia to where I live, so I got a mate and we went on a bit of a road trip, about 8000km round trip (5000 miles) to go pick it up in my Ute.
Engine is a factory cast Rb with indy 440-1 heads, crower rods, cp pistons and eagle forage crank.

 

[No rush]

Went to put the new engine in the car for a bit of a mock up and it didn't fit because of the new k-frame and steering rack. Was sorted easy with help from you guys on the forum and ordered a new sump from Charlie Gilbertson.



Took a year off working on the car to get some other priorities sorted.
So now we get to the start of this year and to now, a long 3 years later.
Engine came back out to go to my engine builder to get a look over and freshen up just to make sure it's all good. While it is out I decided to fill in them horrible looking fender holes and all of the pointless small holes in the engine bay filled in.
I also bought a Reid case powerglide. So with the engine bay 1/2 fixed up I changed the plan and organised for a 6 point roll cage and front rail braces to be installed. I had to grab the engine back of the builder early so I could refit it and send the car back to the fabrication shop, once we did that I realised that there is no room between the new fenders and the head.
As on this week the car has made its way back to the fab shop, list of what's happening is the roll cage and rail bracing, dash and harness bars, custom made gearbox mount for glide, custom made headers and reshape the fenders for everything to fit right.











If you have made it this far thanks a lot for reading, obviously I have left out a lot of information and pictures. If anyone has any questions or suggestion be glad to hear them and answer them. Can post more pictures and explain things in more detail.
Sorry if the formatting is bad made the post of my mobile, will fix it up when I get on the computer.