I have chance at a 46 Plymouth coupe for cheap I also have a 87 Dakota that isn't going anywhere quick. I looked at using the Dakota front frame on the 46. Are the frames close enough where you could stub them together? I like the idea of disc brakes rack and pinion steering with the old styling of the 46. I would use the 8 1/4 rear out of the Dakota are the widths of the Dakota and the 46 close? I know there's aftermarket stuff out there but it would suit me best to use the free Dakota stuff. Thanks for your help.

I have a 49 dodge, not sure how much of a difference, but I have a dakota front clip. I got my help from a Tim Adams on the P15 D24 website, do a search there. I had posted here a couple pics of mine. Go for it and good luck

You can check on
www.jalopyjournal.com on the H.A.M.B.

I think there is a multi page thread about it there

One other option is

www.fatmanfab.com offers parts to lower the front and to adapt disc brakes and I think its Ply-do that has the rack and pinion parts

Thanks I looked on the website but didn't see the information. I figured the car would be more popular, guess not. Did you use the Dakota rear when you clipped your car? Could you use the standard steel wheels? Please post a picture of your car. Thanks!

http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=307020&highlight=dakota

The seach function on the hamb works great unlike others

No, I bought from www.jimweimerrodgarage.com
I used the MII from him and the triangualted 4-bar

Depends on the budget , I think its nice clean install when finished and by the time you buy all the parts, pieces for the swap it ends up about the same

my 48 plymouth was 32 1/2" where it was cut and is 34 1/2" by the fire wall I don't know if that helps

http://i247.photobucket.com/albums/gg121/NoFrillsPlymouth/48003.jpg

I haven't plunked down the $300 for the car yet. Just getting ideas I have the truck and like the way it drives with the rack and pinion steering. There was a guy in Phoenix who had a 46 and he had bolt on disc brakes since they were twin a arm set up from the factory. The frame is pretty narrow from the factory on the 46 I wonder if a v-8 will be a tight fit. When I buy the car I will post pictures.

I was just jazzed to find a car that was rust free, had good glass, and all the doors opened and closed. I was shocked at the gaps in the doors and the fenders they were as nice as a new car.


On a side note the old man has 28 model A trucks, and a ton of old cars. He had a 27 Chivey coupe that he was working on. He had a brush hog made with a v-8 flathead connected to a 36" saw blade. Needless to say he won't be finishing them all.

I had a 39 Plymouth business coupe that had a 1st gen Dakota rear axle under it. it was a very good fit with 15 x 7 wheels. Those were about as wide as a guy would want to go, and that wheel was centered in the fender.

We clipped a 39 sedan with a Dakota clip, it fit real nice frame, matched up perfectly at the firewall. We split the 39 frames "X" member and slid the Dakota inside the 39's frame, but we sold the car before it was road worthy. A 39 has the same frame as up to 49. Have no knowlege about car frames newer then the 48/49 change.

$300 is cheap, that way you will be in it right and you can afford to do some stuff to it

You can stick a 318 in there easy, mine had a 440
plenty of room

Seriously, I'd consider putting the bolt on parts on it ..It would be a nice quick option , others have done it and it works well

You have alot of options with that car. There are a couple places that sell disk brake upgrade kits, Fatmans sell R&P stuff along with the brakes. Its a good solid frame and suspension, worst problem is the brakes and the shock mount is on the upper control arm, which can be moved to the frame. Next thing is the engine, if you keep the flathead, most want to go with a T-5 transmission, or bolt on engine mounts for a small block. Only thing with a small block is the steering box, you need that funky exhaust manifold from a 273 that wraps aroung the column. For more info on 318 swap, check out shadowcustoms website, he's posted here and on the HAMB. I went with the Dakota because of the costs of all the bolt on parts, I got my frame from the local pick n pull for under $50. You can use the rear axle too, but I went with a 8 3/4 since I'm putting in a 383. Lots of stuff on early mopars on the HAMB, getting more popular.

He is correct that you have a lot of options with that car.

We have rolled out of my shop a 39 plymouth coupe with stock frame, disc brake conversion, rack & pinoin steering, and a 3.9 V6 from a Dakota. We put about 8,000 miles on before it went down the road. We did the Dakota clip on the 39 sedan. We did a 360 with headers, 727, a disc brake conversion and an 8 3/4 with the stock frame and suspension in a 47 Plymouth coupe. We did a flathead 6 with OD, stock suspension, drum brakes on a 41 Chrysler sedan. A 35 Dodge sedan with a Volari clip, 318 auto, 8 3/4 we put over 70,000 miles on. We did Dodge trucks too, a 54 with an F,M,& J clip, 360 auto, 8 3/4. a 55 Pannel van with stock suspension with a hot 360 auto, a 50 mounted on an 80 4x4 frame, and currently putting a 77 frame under a 70 short box. Been a few dirt track Mopars thrown in there as well and several Mopar muscle cars. And that's just our stuff, not customers things. A guy can screw up a lot of nice cars in a little under 40 years of building them. Add in a 25 yo son also addicted and the car count jumps again.

After all that, its going to be very hard to beat the price of putting that Dakota under your $300 Plymouth. There is going to be some work that will have to be done, like the Dakota motor will have to be moved towards the rear, several inches to fit in the engine bay. You will also have to modify the Dakota frame in front of the front crossmember and come up with brackets to mount the cars front sheet metal and a radiator. That is all part of the fun. Gene

Hey bigdad... I'm totally new to message boards, so I'm hoping this winds up in the right place...

I have a little '42 Plymouth business coupe. Bought it 3 or 4 years ago and converted to 12 volts, put shorter coils up front and built some blocks to bring the back-side down. Then I took off the hub-caps and I'm pretending it's a hotrod. No power, the engine is leaking oil, the ride sucks and the brakes are scarry. I bought a little 318 with a 904 and now am contemplating the best options of getting it in and making the car stop. I've been looking at the FatMan stub, but you say you went with the JW Rod Garage setup. Gotta ask why you went that way since you seem to be happy with it. I'm no engineer or fabricator so I'm looking for something pre-engineered with a semi-dummy in mind. I don't want to start something I can't finish. Do you have any pictures of the job when it was finished?

welcome aboard, Joe-Bob!
Bigdad should be along shortly.
Do lots of research before choosing any one way to go. It stinks to get half way done and find out that there was a better/easier/cheaper way.
Here is Dakota info
http://66.154.44.164/forum/showthread.php?t=307020&showall=1

Guess I'm kinda predictable ?

Oh, the fatman stub is a good option , I just created the same thing out of rectangular tubing and saved some money ..

Just depends on ones budget..
Here are a couple (lousy) pics ..

One of these days I'll uncover a disc that I have with some decent pics of the build

.. ^^ >>

Since you are located in Pacific NW ..
Contact www.jimmeyerracing.com ..Quality stuff ansk them if there is a shop in area they would recommend to do a IFS swap if thats the way you want to go

Cool DeSoto bigdad. And nice shop, big and CLEAN. I wasn't aware of Jim Meyer Racing. I might have to look into them as well.

I've got a '52 Chev that I've had for about 15 years. It has a Nova clip that was in it when I got it. Too wide and sits too high. Did a lot of custom body work to it, but never finished and lost interest. I want to be sure that doesn't happen again. I need to keep things simple enough that I can stay focused on one task at a time and keep the car on the road. Whacking the frame off without a kit to put it back together would probably mess me up. Keeping the frame in one piece and adding new components seems more do-able.

Money is always another factor. The FatMan stub will run around $2540.00, I'm not sure how much the JW Rod Garage setup is. Rebuilding the stock front end, installing dropped uprights and adding disc brakes isn't cheap either and it sets the wheels out further also.

I'm looking to collect parts until next fall, and have a winter project. I've got some time to get some feedback from different views, make a decision and move forward slowly.

Thanks for the input.

Car looks cool right now I think !!

As I posted earlier in this thread
using a couple sources, you can ..

Lower the front with parts from www.fatmanfab.com
I used to have a link from www.rodandcustommagazine.com that showed them

Installing the parts, new springs and disc brakes
I believe its Ply Do that sells the rack and pinion steering parts for one

That kit will drop the nose 3 inches If I remember right and then use some blocks in the rear ...

No cutting, should be able to knock it out in a weekend ..

Then swap a V8 in or I've seen some hopped up flathead 6's that look neat too

I used a 8 3/4 rear from a 68 Chrysler Monaco
for my rear diff ..


I agree, keep the project simple enough to see it thru

Ya know, I just keep studying what everyone else has, or is doing and try to figure what my best angle would be. At first I thought the dropped uprights and a disc brake kit would be the way to go. Simple and not too expensive... but when you price them both out they run about $1100.00. The JW Rod Garage catalogue came today and their kit is about $1700.00 and you get rack and pinion steering and all new parts. Seems like the better deal to me. It looks like about the same deal as the fat guy's stub with a little more labor on my part for a lot less money. Would that be your opinion as well? Or is there some factor I'm overlooking between the two that I should be concerned about?

By the way, your car is in the weeds. Did you bag it? It really grabs your attention.

No,I had dropped spindles on the front and the coil overs cranked down in back .
Not real practical but, looked cool

"stance" is everything

If you are up to the task of cutting, welding,etc
Yeah, its a good option ..

Those cars have odd frames, most you can just add a crossmember , these due to the taper and design in the stock spring pocket area, no way to do it without cutting it off and replacing it with something ..

The quickest , least amount of fabrication work
is to use the uprights, shock mounts, etc
from www.fatmanfab.com

The stub somewhat eliminates some of the guess work out, you set it in right place and all the rest will be in right spot ..

Its the most expensive to purchase and to ship

I used a Fatman crossmember on my truck

Post deleted by moparpollack

does any one know the first year a dakota came with rack and pinion ? im searching for answers to doing my 40 dodge as well,,,the current dakota uses stuts,,so i believe 2004 and up are out of the question,,,but i thought 2000 was the first year for rack and pinion in a dakota,,

All 2WD were rack and pinion.

all 2 wd including the first generation ?? 1987

The Dakota I used was an '87 and it had rack and pinion. It didn't have a front sway bar, but a bolt in crossmember.

wel ive done some research,,rack and pinion was an option in 1987,,so both styles are out there steering box or rack,,not all are rack,,

has any one used the stock 1940s ply/dodge ifs,with a fat man rack kit,dropped up rights, and full size front coils ??

my car currently has a fat man rack,cut coils to drop the front,,rides terrible,,anda master power disc conversion,,
my thinking is to keep what i have,and put full size coils back in so i have full travel,and dropped up rights to get the stance,, the car rides hard,,steers great,and the brake kit still needs some tweaking,,, any ideas would be welcome
e mail me please i dont recieve e mails from this site fstfish66@aol.com thanks in advance

If you are blowing the front end apart again, go with good springs. I don't know if the dropped uprights will get you back to where you want to be with fresh springs. Over on the HAMB, they talk about cutting off the lower control arm plate that holds the spring, and welding it back on under the arm instead of on top, where it is stock.

As for the brakes, tell us what you currently have and what the issues are.

I have a vette master and booster under the floor of my 40, along with 2.5# residual valves to keep the fluid from draining back to the (lower) master. Volare rotors and GM calipers on the front, unknown rotors and GM calipers on the back. Haven't put fluid in them yet...

The 47 has http://www.aajbrakes.com/ in front, early 70s Chrysler wagon drums in back. It also has residual valves, unknown MC, no booster. I've got to get it running, but I'm not happy with the pedal right now. I'll probably jack it up on each end and rebleed. That job was done by a shop, and they %^#$ed me off, so it won't be going back for final adjustments.


Lots of choices on these great cars now, you just have to find the level your skill sets and pocketbook can handle.

The area I'd like to see some experience in is the sway bar. My 40 Plymouth came with one, but I've read that it's not much help. I don't want to redo all the work, so a bigger bar with stronger end links would be the goal. I'd imagine that there is some racing company that makes a bar that would work, but haven't researched it yet or heard of anyone who has done it.

well it has 11 inch chevelle rotors,, gm pattern,, i hope to change soon,,,i have replaced the poorly built pedal/master mount with a master power pedal/under floor master cyl,,manual 1 inch bore,,10x2 1/2 drums in the rear,i havent had time to look the car is parked in a trailer right now,,cant get to it,, but i believe the disc pads are glazed,,preventing it from stopping like it should,, i built the brake system on my barracuda and its stops great,,

the fat man dropped up rights are about a 2 inch drop,,i guess i would get coils 2 inches taller then whats in the car now,,,so i have better suspension travel,, or go to a dakota clip,.,ide perfer to make the orignal IFS stuff work,,

What I plan on doing since my springs are shot too is to take them out, measure the height with the car at full down, full up and at preferred ride height. Then borrow a local racer's scales and measure what the corner weights are.
With that, a spring company should be able to find or make a pair that are just right.
With the engine offset, I'm not sure they will be the same on each side.

im not sure if fat man has a brake kit for the stock spindles,, ply/do does, master power brake does, and another company called ECI has a kit,,,also a guy called scarebird, i may of spelled that incorrectly,, do A GOOGLE search on dodge or plymouth and include the year of car in your google brake search,,

Google came up with these:


http://www.aajbrakes.com/

http://www.mpbrakes.com/products/product-detail.cfm?product_id=251

http://www.streetortrack.com/34-54-Chrysler-Plymouth-Dodge-DeSoto-Front-Brake-Kits-c-1400.html

http://www.tsmmfg.com/1353.htm

also
http://www.rustyhope.com/

i just remembered look for mr streetrod also