Mopar Muscle Association UK

Dave wrote: ...and at the same time I was crying because my full weight and almost stock Challenger was only running 12.4s @110mph due to problems.

There. That put Pete in his place Kev!

Well, Mate that was my first ever effort, and you have been fannying around with that car for years and year; hardly comparable, is it???

Ooohh!

That was my second or third time on the track I think?
But you are right. It certainly wasn't thrown together the night before. It took ages just to get it to run at all.

Great thread!

Anyway.....

Tell us what happened next.

Patience, hairy Northern person................

Getting back to the pits, we surveyed how the car had fared for what really was a shake-down set of runs. Whilst most of the car was holding together well, I was concerned about the clutch.

As stated earlier, we had installed a new centre-force clutch, removed the “over-centre” spring, and limited the travel as a consequence.
We had also installed a new thrust bearing.

Blue had gone to a lot of trouble to safeguard the parts, such as boxing and bracing the clutch operating arm, rose-jointing all the linkages to the pedal, fitted adjustable stop bolts to the floor, and had also heavily braced up the clutch pivot, which bolts to the bell-housing (in this case a steel one).

Nothing had been over-looked or under engineered – this was one occasion when no lightening holes had been drilled either!

What could go wrong?

Well, quite a lot, actually.

When I was practicing my side stepping techniques in the fire-up lane, the clutch did indeed “ping” back; over-travelled, and managed to get wedged under the dashboard! That car was not going anywhere. Very big screwdriver time.

Another stop plate needed there.

However, the more worrying aspect was that I could not keep the clutch in adjustment. It seemed to be fine when cold, but once the car heated up, the clutch would drag.

More worryingly, the operation of the clutch pedal elicited a grating feeling when the pedal was depressed.
The pedal was not the only thing that was depressed, I can tell you!

Things had deteriorated pretty badly that on the journey home.
Blue was really struggling to find gears, and was willing me to bowl onto roundabouts without stopping – great fun in a 17foot long car with drum brakes and a four speed.

The car literally made it on to the drive way and expired.

In the immortal words of Edmund Blackadder “Ohh, Bugger!”.

Pete wrote:

db wrote:Nice to learn a bit more about the 360 too- (you may well have told me already & i've just forgotten...) i didn't know Ray hisself had done the porting!

Yep, just heard back from Alex - the whole motor was pulled apart. The biggest problem was getting the correct push rod length - I think we ended up with custom Smith Brothers jobbies

I was wondering why i just found 2 spare sets of pushrods...

I remember you saying it was Alex-built

Have you any idea HOW heavy an iron Chrysler 833 gearbox is?

I don’t care that it was not a HD 18 spline Big Block jobbie; it was BLOODY heavy.

And, yes, Alex and I DO know how heavy an 18 spline Big Block jobbie is, because we had taken the bugger in and out about 6 times on the Tor Red ‘Bird.

However, the added complexity to the weight was the steel scatter-shield – you just had no access and could not see what was going amiss.

When the clutch fork and the release bearing was removed, one could see that the fork was moving in an arc as opposed to simply “in and out”.

The top lug of the fork which held the release bearing retaining spring was gouging in to the side of the release bearing.

A new bearing was inserted, and another hernia was duly acquired when hoisting up 300 tons of useless cast iron crap back on to the Bell-housing.

Job done, Nurse! Where is my truss???

When I had replaced the THIRD release bearing, I occurred to me that there was something more fundamentally wrong with the set-up………

Glad to be of service, Pete

Great posting Pete, I wish my memory was that good I have too write most thing down these days.

A more radical approach was required.

Blue kindly made me up a tool out of an old gearbox input shaft so that it would support the release bearing and locate OK with the clutch fork so that the “workings” could be observed without the gearbox being in place.

This was a good step forward, and indeed the clutch fork was not locating correctly.

Weird.

At this point paranoia took hold and I took the scatter-shield off (not easy given the block protection plate) and had a look in real detail.

At this point you want to weep quietly.

Why go to all that trouble to build an SFI standard scatter-shield only to have the clutch pivot arm float in mid air? It beggars belief.

Take a look at the clutch fork, see all the bracing, and then observe that it STILL bends because it is unsupported in the way that it bolts to the scatter-shield housing.

Give me strength!!!!

Clutch forked, despite all the bracing: