Here is a good like for those of you, like me, that are looking to swap a Cummins in to your trucks. Wish I had the time and $ do do it like this.


http://www.turbodieselregister.com/f...hopefully.html

 

*Knock on wood... I'm starting a 79' Snowfighter, HMMWV, Cummins project named... Forge...

 

getting ready to start a 79 f250 CC 2 wheel drive conversion also. trying to find a wrecked donor truck. i have been searching and saving a bunch of info the last few months. still undecided on the tranny though. for sure going with auto. either the dodge or a 4r100. keep everyone posted i will be documenting everything with pics for others too. have a good day. D.J.

 

I have been driving my "Dord" for a few months now, best mod I have ever done.

 

Can I save your info and contact you when I start getting the conversion parts?

 

I'd be happy to help. Before you start gathering parts, I'd suggest getting a whole donor truck. I know I would have spent more money on the transmission and other parts than I bought the whole truck for. When all is said and done, I got about 1/2 the price of the donor for parts I sold from it.

 

I've been keeping an eye out for one, but the direction I was looking at was custom block, custom Ford ZF, and a Ford manual T/C from Fordcummins... any thoughts?

 

I agree about getting the whole donor truck. I bought a 96 Cummins Ram 4x4 for my conversion. It had 560k and was pretty rough, so I got it for cheap. So far I had the engine sleeved and am in the process of rebuilding it. I am keeping the NV4500 and xfer case and hopefully will swap in the Dana 80/60 later.

So far I have broke even on my swap by selling off the Dodge parts I don't need. I almost got the $1500 I paid for the truck out of the ext. cab alone.
It'll make your swap a LOT easier to have all the parts you need. Some of them are very hard to scrounge up by themselves.

 

Hey Forge - if your budget is tight, get the entire truck. If not, the custom setup you mentioned is fine - ZF's are tough and great, and in front of the ford xfer case you will be fine.

However, if budget is a concern, get the entire truck, 12v, intercooler, NV4500 5spd, and NP241DLD xfer case. You skip all the adapters, flywheel, clutch stuff etc. Fix the 5th gear nut while you have it out, put a luk pro gold clutch in if not going over 300hp/700ft lbs in mods. Sell the rest of the truck off to cover your costs, I got within $500 of covering my cost - others above have done even better!

Build your own motor mount towers to bolt to the ford frame using the towers from your donor frame welded to plates that bolt to the ford frame (see my tdr page). Customize your ford crossmember to hold the NP241DLD. With the towers and tranny supported - and clearing that front frame-member (I dropped mine), you now easily have the entire thing installed. The rest is really not hard.

Use the hydraulic clutch parts from the donor, and a piece from the donor's clutch pedal for the master cyclinder pushrod - see Scot or my tdr conversion. Have a driveshaft shop modify your driveshafts to go from the np241dld to the ford yokes - consider putting bigger yokes on the axle, front and back as well, to accept a larger u-joint. Use the grid heaters from the donor, put them on a toggle. Use the alternator from the donor, and a two-wire regulator - or get an internally regulated alternator (Leece ? I think). Get the shutoff relay from the donor (expensive if you have to buy) and hook it to ignition power - for both the pull-in and hold-in wires. Don't keep constant power on that pull in, I did, and smoked it!

Mine is here - called the Fordge! I was thinking of using Forge since it is a real word, and a lot of parts were "forged" to build it. You take Forge, I'll keep Fordge!

http://www.turbodieselregister.com/f...w-cab-4x4.html

Contact me if you have questions. If I cannot answer, jimj, scot, and a few others here now sure can!
jon.

 

Forge (and anyone elese doing this swap), Jon and Scot have pictures and information in their gallerys, and gave me tons of advice that made my swap easy from what I had first thought it would be. I hope to take the time to up date my gallery to show some of the things I did, alot the same as others, but some different as well.

My donor was a '89 non IC Dodge 4X4. The clock showed 89xxx miles, but the PO told me it had gone around twice, amounting to 289k. It had had a new NV4500 installed fairly recently before I bought the truck. I used the engine and transmission, and an adapter from Advance Adapters to attach the NP205 transfer case to the NV4500. Since the trany was new I used the clutch from the donor and have no regrets so far (he says as he knocks on wood) I also used the alternater and voltage regulator from the Dodge and found wiring deagrams on how to hook it up and make it work. I kept the wiring harness from the dodge and the "brain box" and grafted in the dodge harness into the Fords wiring. I found that the oil pressure and temp sending units work fine when tied into the proper wire on the Ford. I have hooked up the "brain box" from wiring diagrams and info I have been able to scrounge on the net so my grid heaters and KSB solonoid (did I spell that right?) all seem to be working as they should. I used the Dodge motor mounts and bulit towers to bolt to the frame as Jon said, but the '89 mounts are different so I had to come up with my own design. I modified the Ford transmission support to attach to the NV4500, dropped it two inches, and moved it back where it needed to be. You will have to lower the front cross member, look at the above gallerys for two different ideas. I had to have the rear drive line built, but was able to use the front drive line from the F350 C6 4X4 that gave it's D60 front axel so my F250 would have the cool factor. (I think the D44 would have supported the weight, but that is my opinion, no experiance)

The hardest part of the swap for me was taking two perfectly running trucks and tearing them apart.

 

I have access to extreme discounts on parts, plus my budget just doubled so cost isn't really a concern right now, however can anyone tell me what you have to do to a 4x4 engine crossmember?

 

If i remember right a c6 will work on those motors

 

Forge - that front crossmember, under the engine on a 4x4, needs 2.5" or so shaved off it, or dropped that far. The oil pan/engine block on the cummins is much deeper than the V8's or 300-I6 these trucks were designed for. I attached a photo from my gallery. I chose to cut it, drop it, and box it back in. Pretty easy with cutoffwheels, sawsalls, welder, and grinder. A torch would be faster, but not as clean I don't think cutting through. Others have done some awesome work at cutting it in half, horizontally. Probably a photo or two on tdr.com.

As for the C6 - I've heard some folks getting it done now. Not sure which C6 they were using - one with a 400 or 460 or larger diameter flexplate/torque converter for sure though. Nice strong tranny behind one of these diesels, need an overdrive solution though. Gear Vendors/US Gear ? Dunno.

 

good thread! I am replying so as to "subscribe" as I will need all of this info very soon as well.

 

Any problems with creaking or strutural integrity?