Magnum conversion info and questions.....

I'm hoping to get the money before I die to get another '70 B body, and I'd love to stick a modern Magnum in there and make a driver out of it.

I think any drop base air cleaner will hit the linkage and sensors. I've been that route on my 95 5.9 Ram. Another way around is to find a late 90's Durango with a 5.2 or a 5.9. Get the air hat and stud relocation bracket off the throttle body. This setup is only a few inches tall but you need to run a duct of some sort. No big deal. You definetly need the stud relocation bracket because the durango air hat has the stud hole in the center while the stud is way offset in the throttle body. I think the durango setup is the best way to go. I used this on my 95 ram along with Spectre build-your-own-aircleaner chrome duct work. I was very happy with the results.

DUH! I should pay more attention, you already have the stud bracket.

Wow. Nice work detailing the engine! Looks sharp! What oil pan and engine mounts did you use? I'm also swapping a 95 5.9 with the S.M.P.I. and overdrive into a 72 challenger. Are you going to reuse the Power Distribution Center from the S.M.P.I.? I'm using every piece I can off the Ram to keep costs down. Any thoughts on the fuel pump and regulator?

Ĥi,this is the pump coming out of a van, it is standing lower than of a truck....I was going to do the opposite but now.....I kept the 904 for easier linkage

The major issue is the steering box and column....will they clear properly with LA headers ?

Daniel magnum

So I dropped the magnum in a 65 b-body. I plan on using efi, but started on a different route. Have not finished yet. yours may be a cheaper way or easier I don't know. I used my car as a test car for Painless who was going efi it with their computer. but they canceled the project. I don't have the money right now to buy the rest of the parts to finish it so it stays in my garage.
However I think I can help with a few of your issues.

First, yes the van power steering bracket is different then the truck one.
It will allow it to fit with the battery. It is tight in an early b, so it should be better for your e-body.

There are the two pumps.

Here is the van pump on the motor in the car.


with the battery installed


Here is the air cleaner I picked. with a double stack of gaskets it clears everything.


I got the old 727 to work and gas pedal with some mods to the new cables. So all the regular throttle body and cable kick down that came with the truck motor worked.

Hoses were the worst part. Here is the hose I finally got to work. Comes off a GMC pickup. I have the info somewhere if you still needed.

I tried a bunch of different ones. Some might work depending on which air cleaner you settle on, and if you keep a/c or not.

I used the truck exhaust manifolds.
You can see how tight it is here.




If you got everything then you should have a couple of these parts on the transmission so you can use the truck kickdown cables.


Then I modded the end of the throttle cable for the truck to match up to my cable.




It is all in but the painless stuff and the wide band o2 sensor for tuning.

Oh, I used the aeromotive regulator, the msd pump, had to get hoses made to mate the ps and a/c to my old lines. Use shcumaker conversion mounts for the early b.

You have to make 50 psi for the 98 and up magnum. don't know about the 95.

The '95 and '94 use 40 psi pump....

Still need infos on how A-body headers clears power steering espacial #7near the firewall

Daniel

I have a 318 Magnum that I am putting into my Volare. I thought I was set on the EFI thing but since I replaced the original LA heads in my 83 D 250 with Magnum heads and topped it off with a Performer and AFB I'm leaning that way with the Magnum engine when I get thet far on the Volare.

Sweet Info Andrewh I like what you did with that conversion. I have 3 Milk Crates of wiring I have to disect to get my wiring together. I am going to keep the power distribution box and try to integrate the EFI system with as little changes to the factory wiring as possible.

Luckily the AC & Heater hoses exit at the same place as they did on my original 70 engine.

My conversion is going to be super cheap. I got the Engine and tranny for $150. The wiring harness, ECU, Oil pan, new headers, missing parts like Dipstick tube and other stuff for about $450 more.

The oil pan and pick up were standard 1974 360 E body parts. I got the oil pan from Ebay and the pickup from Autozone.

The engine mounts are standard 318 mounts for an E body. The 5.9L uses the 340/360 mounts but all I had was 318's so I had to shim the mounts.

I am going to try to integrate the 95 OEM fuel pump into my 70 tank. I am hopeing to integrate it into an old tank by fashioning an Adapter into the top of the tank. If it works I will post pictures. My goal is to keep the whole process 100% factory parts so if I break down in the middle of no where I can get parts at nearly any parts store. It won't be that way but my goal is to get as close as possible.

Hemicuda974, that was a great idea about the Durango air cleaner hat. I just happened to have one and it clears. Now I am tempted to leave the battery out of the engine compartment and place an Air Cleaner Box in place of the battery. I will have to modify the hat since it seems to only go on one way and points to the passenger side IIRC.

I added some more pics here.

Daniel the headers for an A body will work fine. Once the factory Magnum exhaust manifolds are removed the sides of the engine are dimensionally the same. My only concern was the port shape but it isn't very different, Look here. . You will need to add an O2 Sensor in the exhaust. In order to keep the O2 sensor and EGR functional I plan on adding fittings on the inside edge of the collectors.

great info. what mag headers did you try, and do you have any pics of the interference with the steering shaft?

Ok...so I'll get a set of A-body headers and try this, still have a month before snow melts anyway !
THANKS
Daniel [image][/image]

Two things.
Except for how it looks, a one horn air cleaner, the van air cleaner is a standard looking air cleaner if you don't want to deal with the box. I could not figure out where to put it, so I found this m-body cop one instead. But could have gone with the van one.

Second, I had thought about the fuel pump from the truck, but two things stopped me. Well 3 really.
One the fuel sending unit isn't compatible, as I recall, so I would have no idea how much gas was in it.
Second, I think the fuel pump unit as a whole is deeper than my fuel tank. You may find that different for you.
Third, the cost of one if you have to replace it was pretty outrageous, but again I was looking at the 98 and up.

Your bonus is you don't have to figure out a return line like I did since it is self regulating at the pump.

Andrew,
I had a look too at the fuel sending unit in the tank, and it's way too big.....I tought going the simple route and get a universal pump to install on the fuel line, next to the frame rail....

Or any other ideas ? I have acces to a LOT of parts since a friend owns a scrap yard..

Daniel

Anfrew, there is a regulator located just un front of the distr (94 model) this one won't do ?

Daniel

good info on the headers. I was asking about the Eddie 66013 headers and fitting them in a mopar car (M body, so no t-bars to worry about) a few days ago and just ended up hearing crickets

here's a pic of the eddie headers


I'm interested in them because they're coated 409 stainless steel, I could probably use most of the downpipes to fab up my Y pipe, and they're $130 cheaper than the plain steel dougs D453's in ceramic coat.

they're also about the same price as the sum of the ceramic coat hedmans and about 3/4 of the 409 stanless steel parts (mandrel bends, collectors) to build my Y down to the magnaflow Y collector, and they don't have the funky #7 crossover like the cheapie (hedman, hooker, flowtech, summit, dynomax) headers have that make the #5 & #7 spark plug wires a bear to try and route.

I was thinking the same thing about those Magnum headers.......I really like the box too for an air cleaner, haven't tried it but I think it won't fit under, so I though I would have to stick with the one form the van

It is great to have other people work on the same project...it is a boost !!

Daniel

sorry did not know about the regulator for the 94 motor. Again I was researching the 98 and up stuff. the 98 and up has a built in regulator at the pump back at the tank. So eliminating that required I get a different regulator.

The early truck exhaust is supposed to be quite good. 2.5 inch as I recall vs the 2.25 I currently have. However talking to an engine guy he said that bigger is not always better unless you are going full blown racing. In the cruiser department going much bigger than 2.25 causes a lot of low end torque loss.

Plus for me there are not a lot of header choices so it was natural to go with the truck exhaust.

I wanted to go with the late 60's unsilenced air cleaner with the 360 magnum pie pan. But the air cleaners were well over 200 bucks. So I settled on the dual snorkle one, and will pick up the magnum pie pan when I can.

Heck ! I didn't know about the 98 Andrew ! loll

Something else to do if your running a keg type magnum intake. They often have a vaccume and oil leak in the plenum really bad. If you look inside and see oil puddling or heavy oil staining you probably have the problem.

The bottom of the intake has a stamped steel cover that often is warped or not well made. Many people replace the gasket and silicone the crap out of it. I decided to replace mine with a 1/4" Aluminum plate. Hughes performance makes them for about $80 but being the cheap person I am I decided to make my own. I bought a slab of 1/4" aluminum plate from a local metal company for about $30 and trimmed it with a jig saw. It took about 30 to 45 minutes to trim it and drill the holes. After I trimmed it I placed the old plate on the aluminum one I made. Marked and drilled the holes. I reassembled it and it should be good forever.

There is a manifold mod you can do to get better performance that somebody started on mine. They did a craptastic job if you ask me. It involves removing the center divider, shortening and radiusing the runners inside the intake to provide better flow. The previous owners of my engine just butchered it and left rough edges, and uneven runners that weren't smoothed out. There was a good discussion on the mods here. but many of the pics are gone bye bye.

Here are some pics of mine. I didn't get pics of the finished mods before I bolted it up but it isn't hard.

MAKE SURE YOU MARK THE DISTRIBUTOR BEFORE YOU REMOVE IT. I marked the block in relation to the distibutor and the index of the rotor. They are not as simple as just dropping it back in if you didn't mark it. The EFI system is timed off of the distributor and the Ignition timing is timed off of the crank sensor so don't try to adjust the ignition timing by rotating the distributor.

This is a picture of the leaky, butchered manifold I had. That oily plate in the background is the cover. You are not looking at the bottom of the plate that is the top that was inside the intake. See how bad the oil leak was. The side in the lifter valley was almost cleaner LOL.


Here is the aluminum plate I installed.

That's a very neat looking job IMGTX ! I have to do mine too !! oil all over in the plenum..

Thanks for the info on the distributor.....

Danniel

IMGTX,

did you have any problems returning the summit shorty headers after trying them and not fitting? debating if I want to pick up the stainless eddie headers to see if they'll fit since they are routed a little differently and have the collector in a different spot.

Hey Andrew !

I double checked the story on fuel regulators...

THe 5.9l have the regulator built in the pump, only the 3.9 and 5.2l have an external regulator between the throttle body and the distr.

After all.....you were right !!

May be we could use that regulator with a universal pump ?

Daniel

The regulator is the chrome disk like part of the pump the fuel line connects to.

It sticks in the top of the pump in a hole about 3/4 to 1 inch in diameter. The fuel pump feeds up into the bottom through a 5/16 inch tube and the excess fuel is released around it to fall back into the tank.

I had toyed with the idea of mounting a fuel pump on the factory sending unit and then mounting that regulator to the sending unit at the top of the tank. I was afraid of how hot it may get since the exhaust is near so I am trying other options but there are plenty of creative people on here who might have better ideas. I will try to post some pics of it in the next day or two.

I don't know if the regulator can take what a non factory pump can dish out? If so it will have to have a catch mechanism and a return line since the factory regulator just dumps the fuel back into the tank.

Here is one pic.

You have a point there Andrew !!

What's the story with the fuel pump you did ?

Daniel

msd fuel pump 2225 ran 94.70 from summit.

Here is a partial list of what it ran me to do this conversion.
Engine was 742 dollars out of a junk yard.
That was core cost plus all the acessories.
As a bonus the gave me the wiring harness as well.
I got lucky and got a second set of acessories from a all you can pull yard for 25 bucks more.
Got me a second set of lines, a/c compressor, 2 power steering pumps and lines.

Engine and spare parts 767
another set of a/c lines 5
air cleaner 38
new bypass hose 5.14
motor mounts 151
msd fuel pump 2225 94.70
fuel pressure gauge 25.45
aeromotive regulator 151.70
flex plate and fuel filter 182.55
an adapters 45.79
throttle cable 25.37
efi hose 51.75
new belt 43.99
mod a/c ps hose 184.03
oil pan and gasket 257.64

total 2029.11

IMGTX....!

So where are you at ? how did you work the fuel pump ?

What headers are you using ? got pics ?

Daniel

Sorry I haven't posted recently. I tried several things. I took Andrews lead and tried a factory Air Cleaner. The original 70 dual snorkel will not clear the A/C but the later model dual snorkels that have the dented area at the front will. I still want to use the air box but at least I have a plan B now.

I am pretty sure that Andrew is correct and the 94 Fuel pump cartridge will not fit but I am going to try. It is about the same height as the tank but I haven't cut the tank yet to mock up the installation. I will see tomorrow when I cut my spare tank.

If I can't get it to clear I am going to use the hole to try and fab up an in tank pump system.

I will keep you posted.

For my tank.....I will get a spare entrance plate. and weld another tube for return.

Disassemble a stock electric pump, and have it fit on the 67 stock plate, so I can lock up the plate with the round gasket, have it electric and hidden in he tank.........if you can get the picture !!!!

Daniel

Howdy! I am just finishing a 94 5.2 Magnum swap into a 70 W200 PowerWagon, with a 93 46RH.

I have been down the same road and many of the same thoughts that are mentioned here. Before 94 there was a external regulator on the fuel rail, in 94 the switched to the in tank regulator. I really liked the in tank idea. I kicked it around a dozen different ways, but never could come up with a reasonable solution. I ended up using the Auromotive regulator and Summit inline pump, which I believe is identical to the MSD. They are both mounted on the frame rail, and the return runs to a tee in the line, at the back of the frame. So no return to the tank. I had to turn the regulator up to about 48 psi to make everything happy. The pump is a bit noisy.

You can use a 96+ (OBDII) barrel intake and manifolds on the 92-95 (OBDI) engines and ditch the EGR and canister. The PCM will record a code if you check them, but it will not turn on the light. I am using a 98 intake and the Pacesetter headers, with the EGR bung welded up. The OBDII barrels don't have the EGR ports, or you can plug them.

I highly recommend you use the PDC (power distribution). It will make life a lot easier! You need most of the relays anyway. You can then also re purpose the ones you don't. I reused the 2 ABS for my headlights. It also makes dealing with the alternator much easier. It does the MAD electrical mod for you basically. The EFI harness is pretty self contained, it all connects to 3 main plugs (assuming Ram donor), those 3 plugs are on the PDC also.

The wiring was a bit intimidating at first, but the 94 Service Manual was a real life saver! I knew I would never remember all the changes I made, so I began documenting them and creating my own, new wiring diagram. It isn't quite done, but here is the current state.
http://cbodydrydock.com/misc_images/Truck_Wiring.pdf

The engineers were geniuses in my opinion! It was like they engineered the whole drive train to be easily swapped into older vehicles. It only took 4 wires between the EFI harness and the bulkhead to start the motor!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BevgW7RRx30

There was a lot of spaghetti, as I rerouted the harness to mount the PCM on the fender, near the core support, instead of the firewall. The main harness also runs across the front of the engine now, instead of the rear.






I am also using the 94 cruise control. The cruise control buttons unbolt out of the steering wheel in a nice, neat little 4 button pod, perfect mounting under the dash.

The brake light switch is a little different, specially if using cruise. It has 2 circuits, 3 if cruise. 1 is normally open for the lights. 2 are normally closed, one for the PCM and one for cruise. Rather than jerry rig the 94 switch, I used the stock switch and 3 relays mounted just above it. My wiring diagram shows them. Only down side is I can here them click sometimes when braking.

Currently I am using the big Ram air cleaner box, only because it is self contained. But I am working on a way to use the smaller Dakota/Durango air hat and a TRUE cold air system.

I am still working out a couple minor bugs, only 22 miles on it so far! Just got the exhaust installed Friday. The Overdrive isn't kicking in, but I think that is related to the VSS error code I am getting. I am using the 2 wire VSS with the cable pass through from an 89, the 94 Ram used the 3 wire. Anyone got a fix for this? I used PCM# 7 and #47, The 8 volt line and the VSS line, and omitted the sensor return ground.

If anyone wants to kill some time, there is a 17 page thread on Sweptline.org documenting my adventure with this truck.
http://www.sweptline.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=14030&start=0

Happy to contribute any lessons and insights from my experience if I can!!

-Scott

Figured out the speed sensor. Instead of using the 8 volt line and the VSS line, you need to use the VSS line and the sensor ground reference. The VSS supplies its own 5 volt reference.

I am using a 2 wire VSS with the cable pass through from an 89 Ram, I have a spare that came from an 89-90 Dakota. Both were $5 salvage yard parts. The engine ran and pulled much smoother and harder with the VSS hooked up. The OD kicked in also.