More tiny progress made.
I got the engine back together and running tonight. Barely. Suffice to say the main fusible link has been replaced with a mini-fuse that blows with any fuse rated under 30 amps in it. The vibration dampener has slipped. badly, and the timing mark is about 120 degrees out of place. The old one barrel carburetor was completed out of tune and the motor was running pig-rich. As best as I can tell, the timing was badly retarded, but with an inaccurate timing mark I don't know by how much.
The slant six BBD I put on is also worn out. There is a steady drip of gas out of the canister purge port while the engine is both off and running. I also think it leaks down the throat of the carb with the engine off. I have a 318 BBD I pulled of a junked van a few years back that I am going to try. If that doesn't work, I am going to order a carb from
THESE GUYS and I will report back my experience with it. I just don't have the patience any more to deal with junk parts.
The retarded timing and out of tune carb make sense with the horrid fuel economy and performance the truck had when I drove it home. I had absolutely NO acceleration even though it has 3.9 rear gears. Actually, I think the 3.9 rear gears contributed to the vibration dampener slipping since the engine has to run at much higher RPMs to move the truck along with traffic.
The motor runs strong at idle now, but I am still sorting out the kick down linkage and throttle return spring. Eventually, I need to pull the manifolds off (again) to install the Remflex gasket for between the intake and exhaust manifolds.
I confirmed that this head is not original to the motor. The motor is Mopar blue, but the head is a red peanut plug head. I think it came off an industrial application because the two bolt holes on the top of the head near the manifolds were plugged with threaded studs like you see things bolted to in industrial applications.
I think this motor will eventually be a good runner, but it definitely need some TLC. And the wiring on this truck has some big problems. Somebody hacking in a new ignition switch and I think they did a poor job of it. The horns and dash lights don't work, the ammeter jumps around like crazy, and the interior dome light doesn't ever come on.
Also, I drained and refilled the radiator a while back because the fluid in the radiator tank looked pretty nasty and rusty. Well, I checked again tonight and the clean green fluid I put in is now nasty and rusty. Time for cooling system flush. I will probably replace the heater valve at the same time. The heater temp control cable is also broken at the dash controls and the air flow cable is bent and doesn't really work. I have the heater valve jammed "on" and the air flow vent stuck in the defrost position, but the whole cooling and HVAC system needs help. And the blower motor only works on low.
The list of things to do on this truck keeps getting longer, but at least the body is OK and the brakes work GREAT!
More to come later.