Sweet build, the newer Hemi engines are great power plants with good power and fuel economy. Should be a fun truck to drive! Plus old Dodge trucks are the ugliest things around so why not put it in a good looking dent.

 

The '70s Power Wagons aren't bad, my brother had one. I might have bought one of those if I could have found one when I bought my dent.

But I do agree with you that the Dodges before and after the '70s PWs were pretty ugly. I had a '86 D250 for awhile good truck had the same tranny my F150 has but hideous to look at.

 

You are building an interesting truck....great job so far and keep up the great work on it. Thanks for sharing your pictures and progress with us. It is good sometimes to think outside the box on things....

 

Hey jay! I'm totally digging your work man haha
When you said hemi first thing I imagined the 429 boss engine haha
Anyways, I was wondering where you got that air cleaner on your 351??
I've been looking everywhere for that!!

 

Top Ten Reasons this thread deserves reps:

10. Decent grammer and proper sentences in posts.
9. Pictures posted.
8. Fast progress on project.
7. Decisive OP, note "2 seconds" to decide on Hemi when he discovered the deal.
6. Killer deal on the donor
5. He's had the truck since he was 12.
4. Former Navy man going to school still has time for this project.
3. Did the 351w/C6 swap before many here had their driver's license.
2. First cross-brand post that has generated zero hate.
1. First "Hemi swap" thread where OP actually knows what he is doing and the reader can be confident the truck will be running again soon.

There may be other reasons.

 

Yeah the 426 Hemi is legendary. There are builders out there that completely re-sleeve and stroke these 5.7 Hemi blocks to make them 426 ci. But I don't have that kind of money. I got the air cleaner and valve covers as a birthday present, I think when I 13 or 14. So I've had those for a while now. I don't know if Ford racing still makes them or not.

 

Good gosh. This made me feel good. Now I feel like I have some standards to maintain, lol. I wanted to get some welding to the firewall done this weekend, but I've had a room in my house that we needed to finish remodeling. So the room got first priority, not too mention I had two essays to finish before the weekend ended. But the with the room out of the way and most of my big assignments thinning out I will hopefully pick up my pace again soon.

 

joel79ford is not talking about:

http://www.allpar.com/images/engines...treet-hemi.jpg

He is talking about the Ford Boss 429:

http://www.wrljet.com/fordv8/images/429boss-lf.jpg

which has modified hemispherical combustion chambers.....

 

Oh nice I thought the only Ford Hemi engine was the 427 SOHC. Learning something everyday.

 

Yup....Ford rated it at 375 hp, but thers videos out there proving that they hit a little over 500hp...

 

Keepin' an eye out for when you get to the fun parts, AKA "wiring"

 

Alright well I finally have an update. I haven't done too much but last night I pulled the engine and transmission back out. And today I started to weld up some of the many unnecessary holes in the fire wall. Tomorrow I will grind those welds down. Also when I first started working on this truck many years ago I tool the HVAC stuff out and just put in a steel plate. I went ahead and just put some light gauge steel in place and I started welding that up too. I would like to have a relatively smooth firewall and engine compartment. It is still going to be a daily driver so I'm not going over board, but I want it to look good because I'll probably be poppin' the hood quite often.

 

Also something else, I took out the steering column and compared it to the Ram steering column. It looks like I shouldn't have too much of a problem getting it to work for me. But one thing I did have to do is modify the spot in the fire wall that it goes through. The hole is originally shaped like a tear drop or something.


This shape is what I need for the Ram column, however i just need the hole to be flipped 180 degrees. So I went ahead and cut it out and tacked it in for now.


Once I get to where I am starting to hook all that stuff together I'll go ahead and weld that all up. This particular piece is double plated so when the time comes I'll just TIG it on the inside as well.

 

And lastly I was just messing around before I came inside. I wanted to see if the Ram gauges would even fit in my dash. I've seen most other guys go with aftermarket gauges when they do swaps like this. But I'm trying to reuse the factory harness and everything so I think using the factory gauge cluster would greatly facilitate the swap. And it just so happens to fit. I'll just have to make a bezel to work with it. I've worked with fiberglass before but recently I've been seeing some guys do their own work with carbon fiber mat. And after seeing that, I think that's what I will shoot for. But here is a picture with the Ram gauge cluster sitting in.

It'll be a tight fit but nothing unrealistic. I'll get everything to fit nice and snug. As if it were meant to be there in the first place.

 

not bad not bad good thought on flipping the steering column hole i wouldn't have approached it like that but your way looks good great job