My newsed 1968 Dodge Coronet with a 440 engine & 4-speed transmission

[daniel_depetro]

I purchased a bottle of Redline 'water wetter' since I was changing the coolant and 440s produce some serious heat/under hood temperatures.

I also picked up this Stant SuperStat 180 degree premium lifetime warranty thermostat.

Felpro premium water outlet (thermostat) gasket

I decided to install my lightweight aluminum high flow water pump and lightweight aluminum housing at the same time. The aluminum water pump housing alone weighs ~10 lbs. less than the factory cast iron piece.

When I was putting the original cast iron thermostat housing back onto the car my father said "I can't believe you're going to put that 'heavy' thing back on there?". He gives me grief whenever I try to lighten a car up a bit. I said "it's all I got", so he went to the corner of the shop where some of his big block stuff is and dug out a couple of original lightweight aluminum units.
Free score!

Since the coolant will have to be drained down far enough to install the water pump housing, it would be an opportune time to drain it completely and install my aluminum radiator.
This new aluminum radiator should be a huge help keeping the temperatures down on this big block.
This is just a ~$200.00 shipped universal fit eBay aluminum radiator so I will need to fabricate some way to mount it. Then comes the fun task of finding hoses that properly fit.
The dilemma is the radiator support. Because this car was born with a six cylinder engine it has the small (22") opening radiator support and matching small 22-inch radiator.
In order to make full use of this new aluminum radiator the car (radiator support) will have to be opened up on both sides. I'm not going to cut anything on this car, even if it is to make it better.
The aluminum radiator is a lot lighter then the copper/brass factory piece when both are empty, however it is much larger which means it holds more water. So I doubt there will be any weight savings, and it possibly could be ~5 lbs. heavier once installed and the coolant is topped off.
Like the rest of the parts for this build I already had this radiator sitting in the box awaiting installation in another project. I thought it would be better to use these parts up instead of sitting around as you never know what may happen. The actual radiator measures 19" high x 27" wide x 3" thick.

 

[daniel_depetro]

Since I already had everything apart I decided to check the timing chain, just to "see" what was in there. I was glad I did as it had a standard single row non roller timing set in it. This came as a shock to me as the rest of the engine appeared to be built well/correctly. I did get a look at the camshaft, and discovered it is a Mopar Performance 'Purple Shaft' piece. WOOT! Though I couldn't tell what size it was, but I will check when I change the valve cover gaskets. I'd guess it's a .474" / .484" / .509" lift piece.
I added this double row true roller adjustable timing set to the engine and installed it "straight up".

I have a couple extra lightweight aluminum 2-bolt master cylinders lying around so I searched for the aluminum adapter and the cheapest I could find was $45.00 shipped. I wrote an e-mail to Richard Ehrenberg (Mopar Action magazine technical editor & all around Mopar tech guru) and he told told me he was pretty much out of the master cylinders & adapters so he was searching for more secret stashes to purchase. He agreed to sell one more to me and gave me a heck of a deal on it to boot! I prefer the larger 1-1/8" bore units so I decided the $74.00 shipped price was way to cheap to pass up. This is about half what they sell for from Mopar Performance/Wilwood/Strange/Moser (which are all the same units). Not to mention this comes with the adapter as well. The factory ones I have use a small bore so I'll just sell them on eBay/Mopar forums to pay for this new set-up. The aluminum master cylinder with adaptor saves about 3 lbs.

Without spending money (aluminum block, aluminum heads, lighter billet aluminum carburetor, fiberglass hood/fenders/trunk lid/bumpers, ...), seriously cutting the car up, or completely gutting it out there isn't much else that can be easily swapped or lightened up.
One thing that where weight was left on the car was the bulky heavy original starter. The 10 lbs. lighter high torque mini-starter wouldn't fit (hit on the header).
We weighed the car once when we first got it, but I forget what the weight was now. It was fairly light for a fully dressed all iron B-body. Though I have since added quite a bit of weight to the car with the larger rear axle & larger rear brake swap.
I am hoping to keep the weight below 3,500 lbs. with a full tank of fuel and all fluids topped off. That would be very light for an iron block/iron headed 440 powered B-body.



I installed the aluminum master cylinder & adaptor and bled the brakes. I also got the radiator sitting right where I want to have it mounted.

 

[daniel_depetro]

Starting to clean up the body and laying on some fresh primer where there was surface rust.

I was able to remove the massive 225/70R-15 front tires and replace them with a near new pair 205/70R-15 Kelly Explorer tires from Pomp's Tire for the magic price of free. They are not squared off like the old ones and fit the car much better.
I was also able to lower the front end down about 4-inches.

Hood up:

Hood down:

Also took the front end all apart to have access to work on getting the front end back to perfectly square.

I also took it out for the first time since I installed the carburetor, intake, double row roller timing set, master cylinder, ...
Wow, what a difference. An honest 110% improvement.
The car is now as powerful as it should be for just being 'slepped together' (minus all the fine tuning and such). It finally runs like a 440. I just wish I had more time to play with it, but at least it is ready for the spring.

 

[daniel_depetro]

Before it went into hibernation all the edges were sanded down and painted over to get rid of all the surface rust that was forming where the old paint had worn thin/through.
This photo shows the complex curves and sexy lines of the Coronet body fairly well.
I like that hour glass figure.

 

[daniel_depetro]

With the driver side fender removed from the car we discovered it was a 1969 fender that had been converted to a 1968 unit.
With our eyes peeled for a nice fender at a reasonable price my dad hit the gold mine when he stumbled upon this ridiculously clean driver side 1968 Coronet fender at the Jefferson, WI spring 2010 swap meet for $200.00.
It was originally a light green color and didn't even have any surface rust on the inside anywhere!
My dad had the fender all done in primer and edged out in the correct blue. A little more sanding some fresh primer and it'll be ready for paint.

 

[Sneke_Eyez]

Wow.
Thats a hell of a lot of good progress on that car, right there.
The engine work and the resulting power gains must have made you feel good, especially since you did it on the cheap!
I can't wait to see the body work done, its so clean to begin with that it doesn't seem like its going to take long!

 

[daniel_depetro]

The fender is painted and installed. Ended up using generic rattle can primer from Wal-Mart and it worked like a charm, no more lifting. I'm not extremely happy with the way it mates to the door so we'll see what the future holds for it.

In an attempt to get this pig of a 440 4-speed to run more like a muscle car should I decided to look for a good used Holley 750 cfm double pumper, 750 cfm Street HP, 750 cfm HP, or a 950 cfm Street HP carburetor with mechanical secondaries.
I haven't seen anything remotely reasonable so I chose to turn my Holley 4777 650 cfm double pumper street/strip carburetor into a more performance orientated carburetor.
I purchased this authentic Holley 750 cfm HP cast zinc main body in the dichromate finish to match the rest of my current carburetor. $137.35 shipped was the price for it brand new off eBay.
The main body retrofit kit includes non-stick metering block gaskets, non-stick fuel bowl gaskets, main body gasket, fuel bowl screw gaskets, and brass 72/84 jets. The accelerator pump discharge nozzles are both .031".

Turns my current Holley 4777 650 cfm double pumper mechanical secondary carburetor with straight leg boosters:

Into this Holley 750 4150 HP carburetor with down leg boosters:

 

[daniel_depetro]

Apparently the dichromate main body I ordered was lost in transit somewhere so I talked with the seller and he agreed to ship me another one immediately. He also let me switch to the 134-300S which is the exact same part but has a shiny silver finish.

Since I was able to get a shiny HP main body I decided to pull the trigger and just build a performance carburetor piece by piece.
I could get the off the rack Quick Fuel Technology Q-750 performance street/strip carburetor for $550.00 shipped off eBay. The problem is I like the looks of the new Holley aluminum 'V' fuel bowls which would add another $80.00 to the total price tag.
Can I actually piece together a true performance carburetor without compromising any parts I want to use from scratch for the same cost of the above mentioned QFT Q-750?
It'll be a wash initial investment wise, however at least I will have the Holley HP shiny main body and lightweight aluminum shiny 'V' bowls that I wanted. Putting together a cost effective aluminum & billet performance carburetor for a street car is no simple task and yet this will prove to be the easy half of the equation. Tuning it to actually run as well as or hopefully outperform the pre-built off the shelf performance carburetors will be a far more difficult challenge. Only time will tell if I succeed or epically fail.



Quick fuel Technology billet metering block conversion kit for Holley 650-800 cfm double pumper carburetors (#34-105). These feature QFTs exclusive positive retaining vent baffle, Adjustable idle feed restrictions, 3 pre-drilled emulsion channels, and stainless steel idle mixture screws with nylon seals. These also have 4-corner idle and have the primary spark advance tube for use with a vacuum advance distributor. This helps with fuel economy and needlessly/continuously dumping fuel into the engine with a mechanical advance distributor. Will it make much of a MPG difference on a performance 440/4-speed car? Negligible at best, but not squirting unwanted fuel at times is always a good thing and who knows what vehicle this carburetor will end up on in the future. $102.44 shipped

My wife got me this Quick Fuel Technology 750 cfm billet baseplate (#12-750) for a Christmas gift. It features 4-corner idling capability, Teflon coated slabbed shafts and low profile button-head screws for increased flow, stainless steel 1-11/16" throttle plates, power valve blow-out protection, adjustable secondary cam bracket, linkage kit (includes super progressive and 1:1 link). $142.90 shipped.

My parents also donated to the cause and got me the following pieces as Christmas gifts.
Holley lightweight aluminum center hung 'V' fuel bowls. Each of these pieces are .60 lbs. (each) lighter then the standard zinc units. The primary fuel bowl is #134-71S and the secondary fuel bowl is #134-73S with the accelerator pump provision. They have glass sight windows for easy float height adjustments without the need to remove a plug and seep fuel all over. I ordered the fuel bowls with the two needle and seat kits as well as the two needle and seat hardware kits for a combined total of $102.93 shipped.

(x2) Holley steel tipped adjustable needle and seat (#6-500-2).

(x2) Holley needle and seat hardware kit (#34-7).

(x2) Holley steel float hanger and hardware kit (#20-105). $20.85 shipped.

 

[daniel_depetro]

I still need to pick up a power valve, primary & secondary accelerator pump kits, float, and a notched float and jet extension kit, fuel bowl mounting bolts,...



Here is my carburetor after I test fit a few things and snapped a couple photographs.

 

[cornucopia]

cool coronet! reminds me of the one I used to own:

I sold it to a guy in new Zealand of all places...

 

[daniel_depetro]

Thanks, your old one looks nice! Very similar cars.

 

[benlambo]

Sweet Project Daniel! I really appreciate the step by step photos and running commentary. Makes me excited to get back to work on my own 68 Coronet 500!