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73 Roadrunner Clone with 5.7/545rfe (very pic heavy)

rescuediver1982

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My Gen 3 swap thread… Its been a journey that isn’t quite over yet!

*Get through the primer and it will quickly get to the meat and potatoes!*



I started with a 1973 Plymouth Satellite. It is a factory A/C car with a factory 318. It ran and drove (albeit not well) I am pretty sure the main bearings on the engine were out and the valve guides as well… it smoked more than a 1970’s nascar fan… But it was a long time California car with perfect floors and what I thought was a great body!

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73 roadrunner project by rescuediver1982, on Flickr

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73 roadrunner project by rescuediver1982, on Flickr



So off I went, first I decided to tackle the body because I knew my Gen 3 swap was gonna be costly and I wasn’t sure how exactly the best way to do it was…

I had the body dustless blasted after I found some nasty looking filler in the rear quarters. For what it is worth, I like the simple, quick, nondestructive process of the dustless blasting but be warned. That crap get everywhere! You will find caked on glass sand in every nook and cranny ever created by those ma mopar engineers!

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73 roadrunner project by rescuediver1982, on Flickr

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I found out the rear quarters had been wrecked pretty good, but they don’t make swap quarters or patch panels for the sections I needed… So off to pull out some metal, massage steel, and bump them back into shape. With some filler, some primer, some more filler, and finally more primer. In the process I deleted the radio antenna and the fender mounted turn signals. (some people may not like that idea but I didn’t like the square turn signals on the nice rounded body...)

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73 roadrunner project by rescuediver1982, on Flickr



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Ohh… and this cool OE RR hood from a swap forum on FB! It was in pretty good shape!

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After much primer and body work, It was finally off to motor swap land!

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73 roadrunner project by rescuediver1982, on Flickr



My friend Nathan typically does LS swaps in his sleep. He previously did a 6.1 Hemi in a bad *** 69 Coronet back in the early days of Gen 3 swaps. He is the mastermind behind most of the work. I was there for motivational support, lifting heavy things, and overall just complaining about the prices… I learned a ton and what was going to be a down and dirty quick swap turned into a “let do it right” swap.



First thing first we got rid of the tired 318 and set the donor 2009 5.7 Hemi. It had good clearance in the bay on each side. It even cleared the massive factory power steering box! I used a Milodon Gen 3 swap pan. (Be careful that you get the correct one for your application. The 2009 Hemi is different than 2003-2008 and you must have a different pickup tube!)

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73 roadrunner project by rescuediver1982, on Flickr

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Now to mount it in place. I used a set of Schumacher spool mounts . They would have worked great if I didn’t want to use the low mount AC… but we can’t have that AC unit sitting way up in there now can we?!? So we cut the spools off and made our own mounts utilizing the basic design of the original spool mount!

Here is the original mount:

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73 roadrunner project by rescuediver1982, on Flickr



Essentially we cut the original horns off of the factor K-Member and flipped them around backwards! This sets them back about 3 inches and creates the space needed for the lower a/c compressor.

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73 roadrunner project by rescuediver1982, on Flickr



We used plate steel for gussets to reinforce the new k-member mounts:

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Then we set the engine back down on into place and lined up the spools with the plate we cut to mount to the block before welding them in place.

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A small spacer piece of box tubing was used as a spacer on one side.

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You must use a 45 degree oil filter adaptor. I got mine from Mancini without any issues.

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So the engine fits and the low mount AC compressor fits as well. It all cleared the factory power steering box. The Doug’s 5.7 swap headers fit really well except the large steering biscuit (rag joint for those familiar with GM products) on the steer shaft. So it was off to find a solution. Flaming River sell’s a similar product but it appeared to be astronomical in price! So I made my own!

I used a Borgeson steering joint smooth shaft tubing to Chrysler spline and a union to go from the smooth shaft of the factory steer shaft to the new shaft I cut down. The Borgeson steering joint is much smaller and provided the clearance I needed to fit my headers completely unmolested! (yeah, no header dimples for me!)

By the way, I got a great deal on the Doug’s Swap Headers on Ebay. About half of the price of the TTI models.

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So now that the engine was mounted into place we had to get the transmission tunnel cut out and the 545RFE mounted into place. We started by cutting the tunnel out.

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Now after we got the tunnel cut we had to make the transmission crossmember. It was pretty straight forward, I took the factory member, cut out the center and reinforced everything. We found a Chevy rubber transmission mount works nearly perfectly with this setup so I welded it all together pretty quickly!

Before:

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After:



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There was no real magic to where we cut. We just tried to cut the least amount out as possible. I was able to cut a small enough amount out that we can make my factory AC/Heater box work!
 
So now the easy part was done, motor is in, transmission is sitting in place. So now it was time to button up all the loose ends that really adds up… gas pedal, cooling, A/C, hoses, fuel supply, etc…

So for starters, here is what I did for power steering. I used the factory steer box with the later model power steering pump. I know this is an area of concern because several people speculate that the increased late model pressure will be too much for the steer box. I have read numerous build threads where other have had no issues at all, so I am taking the chance! I went to a local parts store that makes power steering and hydraulic hoses and had a custom hose made with some an adapter fittings I got from Summit!

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Cooling system:

I used a low buck aluminum champion swap radiator. The Coronet 6.1 has a champion and had never had any issues as Nathan had been using them on his LS swaps for years and never had an issue! I used the swap radiator and found the LedFoot Racing shroud to match with 2- 12” fans all for 300 bucks shipped… Fit was ok, not the greatest. Be prepared to drill some bolt holes to get the flange to sealed to the cowl.

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Plus an added bonus, built in transmission cooler! I got my adapters to go to the 3/8 copper cooler lines from the Napa parts counter. For the transmission side, you will need to get the 90 degree adapters from Bouchillion to convert to the 3/8 copper line.

Another pic of the transmission cooler lines:

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Lower coolant hose I used:

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Upper Coolant hose I used:

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Fly by wire pedal: we made this nifty bracket to stand it off the firewall a bit and give it a good feel consistent with the factory pedals. All in all it turned out really nice and doesn’t look that out of place…

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The Hotwire harness requires you use the proper brake switch from a 2005 ram I believe. We used the factory brake switch bracket from the car and modified it just a little bit. It now gets bolted right to the brake pedal like the factory switch!

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Wiring… ohh that wonderful, wonderful mess, Luckily I have Nathan! ?First if you haven’t figured it out, we used a hotwire harness. Super easy, everything was labeled. But to take make it all fit…. The old stuff though… that was the trick!

I relocated the battery to the trunk to really clean up the engine bay. To do so I ran 0 Gauge through the car using the factory wiring tunnels along the rockers. Once at the firewall we used an firewall passthrough stud block that worked out super slick.

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From the trunk, across the rear tub, into the quarter, and through the passenger side wall into the cab

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Into the wiring channel with a some notching, and an old piece of vacccum hose to cover the sharp edges.

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Nathan cleaned up all of this old factory wiring and tied it into new blade style fuse blocks added alongside the Hotwire blocks.

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Then added some new Intellitronix LED gauges in a classic dash insert.

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The dash got a little work too, the old one was cracked pretty bad. So some filler, some texturizer, and some paint and I created a little bit of an update.

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The A/C… this was a factory A/C car so I wanted to keep it an A/C car as this will be my daily driver… so I got a new evaporator for inside the factory a/c box, these gen 3 compressor fittings from Bouchillion, and set out to make our own system! We got a universal a/c condenser for the front, a dryer, and the required trinary switch!

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We utilized elevator bolts to secure the cold hoses inside the inner fender and hidden out of sight

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We brought the hoses in through the side of the engine bay before it will get terminated into a 90 degree bend.

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Now we had to get a shortened oil dipstick. I utilized a truck hemi dipstick and shortened. We flanged the tube and shortened the stick at the handle by pushing out the rivets.

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Fuel System- I used a Tank Inc in-tank unit with the slosh tray. Installation was pretty straight forward. The toughest part was removing all of the extra vent tubes from old factory fuel tank. We changed things up from the Tank’s Inc instructions by threading new bolts in from the bottom with extra sealer. The pump unit then just sits on top and you utilize nuts to keep it in place. This seemed much more secure than screwing it directly into the top of the tank’s sheet metal. I also utilized an aftermarket sending unit I got from Summit.

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73 roadrunner project by rescuediver1982, on Flickr

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73 roadrunner project by rescuediver1982, on Flickr

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We ran the efi fuel line along the frame rail and used a corvette fuel filter to regulate the pressure down.

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We built these stand offs to keep the new elbows coming out of the fuel filter from contacting the floor of the trunk.

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Finally she roar’d to life… (hmmm, I cant get the video to work)


Now the worst part ever… buttoning up the trans tunnel! We used old brake tubing to form a mold and created paper templates to lay over the outline. This worked out well and we made the tunnel from about 5 different sections.

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So after all of that, we tore it all out. Why you ask? Because it badly needed some paint… so between work, kids, an other obligations, I finally got the some paint on it! After I re-massaged some body work I had noticed while it was on the lift, I blocked it all down with 600 grit and reprimed it all. Followed up by 3 layers of PPG DBC2000 Sublime Pearl Green and covered it with 2 coats of All Kandy Wet Wet Plus clear coat… I am pretty happy especially since I have never painted anything of this magnitude!

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So now this is where I am… the motor is ready to go back in. We will mount up the slap stick, order a driveshaft, and get some exhaust fabbed up! The next couple of month should be promising!!
 
This is amazing, I thought about doing this when I started my restoration back in 2011, but now that I see what's involved, I am glad you did it and I kept my 340 RR pretty much original. Nice job, cant wait to see it when its done! Too bad you are not closer to Colorado, it would be a great car for our annual Mopar only show!
 
Just curious, what did they charge you to blast your car? I've been contemplating it but the two guys I spoke to want $1500-1700...
 
This is amazing, I thought about doing this when I started my restoration back in 2011, but now that I see what's involved, I am glad you did it and I kept my 340 RR pretty much original. Nice job, cant wait to see it when its done! Too bad you are not closer to Colorado, it would be a great car for our annual Mopar only show!

What part of Colorado? My uncle has a cabin the family uses whenever they like, it’s around Colorado Springs I believe!
 
Just curious, what did they charge you to blast your car? I've been contemplating it but the two guys I spoke to want $1500-1700...
I paid $500 and he came to me. Now that was only for the exterior. I found another local shop that does it but they just charge by the hour at $125 and I think they estimated a full car inside and out at 7 or 8 hours.
 
That would be great....Thats what I kind of figured down here too....even more So since the things are built here in Houston...
 
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