Topic: The Yankee Express, a Vermont Rat.

[Ghostridersixseven]

From this...to this.....

 

[Ghostridersixseven]

One more.......

[Ghostridersixseven]

I saw a photo spread on the RoadKill Road Runner that had the exhaust exiting out of the back up light holes. Trick. and I had to have it on the Express.
I shopped around for a 70 RR rear bumper and learned that my pal Gary had one he would sell. I picked it up and brought it home to mock up on the rear of the car.
It was too short. So, to figure out how long it had to be I sliced it in half and mocked up the left half in the location that made the outer edge profile match the upsweep of the edge of the tail extension above it. I wanted a smooth curve top to bottom. I learned that the center needed 4 5/8" added in. An issue cropped up with the bumper mounts too. The 70 Runner mounts ere fine but about 1 1/4" short of connecting with the rear of the car with the bumper in the location it needed to be. So, spacers? Where to put them? Between the mount base and the car, or between the bumper face and the mount ears?
Plus, to get the bumper to sit where I wanted the spacing was different on the top bolts and the bottom. Also the rear valance had to be holed for the exhaust to poke through.

Pictures......

[Ghostridersixseven]

Power corrupts.....absolutely......

   So, time to talk about brute force. The Chrysler 440 V8 is perhaps the most brutal big block for shear torque that came out in 1967. The 1972 440 Magnum is a real monster.  I took a 72 block up to RPM Racing Engines for them to give it some loving attention. It got cleaned, massaged, degreased, cut, scraped and bored. The forged steel crank got polished, the cam bearing fitted, the cylinders bored to 0.40 over and honed to perfection, the decks got milled and the cylinders squared up, new Speed Pro pistons/pins and moly rings, new mains and rods, polished and shot peened LY connecting rods, ARP hardware, Melling High Volume oil pump, some minor repairs to one head. The 346 cylinder heads got fully ported and polished, the valve seats unshrouded, the intake gaskets matched to the ports and excess material ground away. Assembly added a Mancini Racing billet aluminum rear main seal tower and custom bolts, plated timing chain cover over billet steel timing gears and dual chains, new pushrods, positive Teflon valve seals and new guides, valves ground, Comp 21-306-4 Cam & lifters, Comp springs 316-11 and titanium retainers with 10*locks, factory valve hardware. Mopar covers painted VHT High Temp wrinkle black. Weiand Xcelorator single plane intake powder coated in Alien Silver and Black, Holley dual feed four barrel 750 CFM carb and plated fuel rail with liquid filler pressure gauge. Mallory Unilite dizzy with electronic ignition module. Taylor Racing 8mm plug wires with 90* boots. Felpro gaskets throughout. Factory HP exhaust manifolds into TTI pipes. Water pump is a factory MH unit with the right hand drop and the sewer drain inner passage painted in VHT wrinkle Black w. new bolt kit. March polished Aluminum pulley's.
This mill should produce around 484 HP and 476 ft lbs torque.  True neck snapper.

Pictures..

[Ghostridersixseven]

more pictures,,,.......

[Ghostridersixseven]

With all of that power there needed to be big meats on the rear.....

Mancini Racing supplied the Leaf Spring Relocation Kit so I could move them up under the frame rails, which, along with the tubbing of the wells would give me 15 3/4" of room in the rear wells for tires. The M/T Sportsman 29.50x 15.50x15's have 13" of tread width and a section width of 15.25. Full house.
I will admit to being nervous when I first outlined the frame rail before cutting into it. This Mod is actually the very first one that I did on the car. But, it went okay, I took the new spring mounts for the front and after cutting the old frame bits away from the four bolt perch tab I welded the ne one to the side of the tab. THEN i installed the frame piece in there after bolting it up. Very strong. Piece of cake. lol.

Pictures.....

[Ghostridersixseven]

Came across a few more photos that should have been included elsewhere to add context to the narrative. If you have read all of the posts up to now then you will understand the context of each photo. If not...then go back and read it...lol.

[Ghostridersixseven]

The transmission is a 1974 727 automatic from behind a 440. I rebuilt it myself. It now has a spotless case, 12 spring sprag, 5 disc clutches, 4 pinion planetaries, 4.2 ratio billet steel release lever, heavy duty band, Red Eagle Racing frictions & Black Kolene Steels, new everything else and a shift kit.

The rear axle is the one that came with the car, an 8 3/4 non Sure Grip that I cleaned up and repainted. The brakes and hardware are all new. For the center pull E Brake I bought two left hand stock cables as the right one is a lot longer to reach over the drivers side where the apply cable connection sits. By using two left hand ones the cables are even length and go into the floor hump in the center of the car.

The stock exhaust manifolds dump into TTI 3" tubes and a pair of turbo mufflers to exit through the back up light holes in the bumper.

The Audi dash and door elements are a dark grey color but i'll be spraying portions in black and covering other parts in saddle color pleather fabric. Here a couple of pictures of cars from which I took inspiration for the interior scheme.