Cummins 4bt turbo in a Satellite Sebring Plus

At the risk of being thrashed by many purists out there, I'm responding to the person who was inquiring about dropping a Cummins 6bt into a Dodge Demon. While the 6bt was the first choice for my swap, the sheer mass of such prompted me to go with the 4bt (which is comparable to the mass of a RB engine). Yes there is some serious work involved with hanging the engine from a hoist while you custom-piece the motor mounts in place and it may require you to get a hood scoop to deal with the tall nature of the engine. You'll also need to throw the 318 torsion bars and install those that are made to support an RB engine, but this type of a project is not out of the question. The decent mileage that I'm pulling (about 34 mpg) and the moderate engine noise with minimal exhaust noise that Johnnie Law can't rag about makes rolling down the road at 70 mph and 2000 rpm a great feeling. If any of you want to see the specifics of this beast, feel free to drop a line.

Brian

How about posting some pics and giving some info here? I followed the link in your sig, but, I'm not a member there(and don't want to be).

Oh, you're a new member. Welcome!

Hello John,

My newness to this forum is a deficit as it relates to posting photos, but here goes the first with an attached picture of the engine compartment.

Brian

WOW! COOL

Maybe I need to rethink the powerplant for my wagon??

More pics please, pretty please?

That is awesome. I agree...more pics

John et.al.,

Since you've undoubtedly seen an end-of-the-muscle-era Satellite before, I'll only post the engine-related pictures. Here's one of the liquid-filled motor mounts when they were finished in the fall of '08

Work then began on the passenger side of the engine with the addition of the Wix air cleaner and turbo charger ....

Eventually the radiator from a '69 Dodge Coronet and the charge air cooler were added and were connected by a custom-built tapered air transfer tube ....

You could of at least painted it HEMI orange. Nice job. What tranny?

The driver side of the engine lost its battery (i.e., went into the trunk), the original power steering pump was custom-mounted to the block, an electric fan was mounted on the engine-side of the radiator, and the remaining ducting was connected to the intake manifold of the engine ...

Howdy Pete,

Well in all respect to the engine, she just had to go back to her original Cummins tan color. Regarding the transmission, it’s an A727 which was originally attached to a Cummins 6bt in a 1989 Dodge 1-ton. The stubby tail-stock on this diesel tranny would have required me to construct a new drive shaft, but the guy who rebuilt it was able to pull the tail-stock from the original gas 727 and fitted it to the diesel 727 (he’s right up there with God). A lower stall-speed torque converter was also added to the rebuild of the unit. This diesel tranny was fitted to the 1989 4bt block with a 1990 vintage adapter and flywheel which came from a Nebraska bone yard (thanks to Carparts.com).

So can you relate to spending more time trying to acquire and service a part than actually installing it?

Brian

Thanks for the pics Brian! CLEAN! OMG! I may never lift the hood on my car again.

What made you decide to do this swap?

Very cool out of the box thinking and very nice work. Me, and I am sure many others would like to hear a lot more about this. More pictures and more information. You mention 34mpg which is way cool. You get to drive a classic with great pratical use. How about performance? Did you leave the 4BT stock or have you done anything with the pump & injectors? Anxious to hear more.

Wow--incredible. Nice work.
I am curious to hear/see more too. Whats the powerband like on that?
What rear gear? (I imagine the lowest,numerically, available in whatever rear you chose)

Very cool.
Anyone ever look at you funny when you grab the diesel pump at the station and insert in in THAT car?

If you guys follow the link in his sig, you can read about the build up, but, you won't be able to see the pics unless you register (I broke down and did).

If I remember correctly from what I read, Brian went with a real HIGH gear ratio, something like a 2.23 out of a Diplomat. I assume because he didn't go with an OD transmission?

In looking thru the buildup pics from the other site, the only thing that alarmed me was how he moded the steering linkage rather than mod the pan. Looks stout, but I still wonder if the pan would have been easier?

Doubt I'll ever get to build something like that, but, lots of cool stuff on the other site.

As a follow-up to some of the additional questions that arose in previous posts, the driving force for this project was both of necessity and practicality. The necessity part had to do with dealing with the fallout from work-related stress and needing something to shift my mental focus to. My doctor said that it would come down to taking medication or else get myself some involved type of a major mental diversion. The practicality side dealt with having a 318 gasser that really did nothing for the car except get it from point A to Point B in a mundane and non-economical manner. Being a farm kid who worked around diesels quite a bit, a swap to such an engine seemed to be the best way to clear my mind and bring the car into a more economical mode.

With regard to performance, the engine was bored 0.050” over and an intercooler was added to the package. The engine tag says 105 horsepower, but it’s probably five to 10 over such because of the fore-mentioned additions. I even went so far to wrap the exhaust manifold in order to keep the exhaust gasses as raging hot as possible in order to give some added spin to the turbo. This approach also keeps the engine compartment and passenger compartment reasonably cool. Acceleration from a dead stop is such that I probably wouldn’t challenge a VW Rabbit off the line, but the SlapStik shifter allows me to bring the engine RPMs up to about 2000 rpm and then bump it into the next gear while releasing the accelerator pedal a little bit. Of course the 2.24 rear end gears (out of mid '80s Diplomat) will never cause a strain on the neck muscles upon take-off, but all things considered the car breezes up to the desired speed reasonably well. Oh yes, and people do look at me wierd when the car is parked at the diesel fuel pumps with the big rigs.

In order to bump the performance a little more, I’m planning to blend either virgin coconut, sunflower and/or soybean oil with a little gasoline to serve as the base engine fuel. I’ve collected about 300 gallons of this stuff right now and the supply keeps growing. You might raise an eyebrow to such a concoction, but there’s a farmer in Kansas by the name of Daniel who is doing just that in order to run his diesel-powered combine and pickup. He claims that there’s an increase in power and a decrease in fuel usage by going with this approach, and you can follow up on his website by going to http://www.oilcrusher.5u.com/index.html . There are some temperature and viscosity-related concerns regarding this approach, but being a summer car in Wisconsin there won’t be a great deal of times that it’ll be out of the shed when the temp is less than 50 degrees F.

Feel free to drop me a line if you have any more questions. I really enjoy seeing what others are doing in this forum – it’s a great community to learn from.

Brian

now you need to get a jake break hooked up I bet that would turn heads lol

WOW I thought swapping out a 360/727 2wd in my 85 crew cab long box to a 91 cummins 2002 nv4500 4x4 was great,,, Now you have me wanting to put a cummins in my 74 satellite. Great looking car you have there.

HELL,I THOUGHT I HAD A NEAT CAR THAT IS WAAAAY
COOL.

Who says that a mid 70s B body can't make fuel mileage? 34mpg!!! that is right up there with my wife's TDI Jetta and is way more roomier. HMMMM, maybe TBB needs a heart transplant. No but it sure would be cool.

I like it! Well done!

Hmmmm. Bad ideas.....

A 4BT in a Duster would be cool!

I love your Satellite!