Time to light her up!

[2Luke2]

I hope everyone is having a great day today!  We are excited because we think we are ready to startup today, but I wanted to run the process we were going to follow by everyone to see if you can spot any errors in our thinking. We have a few things to iron out, but for the most part here is the to do list.

- Prime oil pump for an unknown amount of time to get some oil circulation.
- Install oil drive
- Install dizzy
- Line up the rotor in the dizzy to point to plug #1
- Put number one cylinder at TDC(not sure how yet, Maybe leave the dizzy out and tap the start? I think that could damage something though. We also don't know when we are at TDC).
- Snug, but not tightin the dizzy
- Clean our workspace
- Check all fluids
- Setup the camera
- Make sure the carb bowls are full of fuel
- Crank her up and immediately bring her to 2000-3000 for 20-30 minutes varying the rpms between 2000-3000 to make sure oil is slung everywhere
- After that enjoy hopefully many miles of cruising!

We are probably missing something, but we aren't sure what it is. If you see something please let us know!

Thanks!

[maxwellwedge]

I like to rotate the crank 90 degrees at a time while priming the pump. Gets more oil into all the areas.

Take #1 plug out and bump engine until the compression is felt. Then slowly bump until the timing marks line up TDC (0 degrees).

Line up the slot on the distributor gear to how the FSM shows.

Drop in distributor and point rotor to #1 plug wire on cap.

Search the forum for many more tips - it has been discussed many times before.

Good luck 

[2Luke2]

Thanks for the tips. I will do a few more searches before the time comes. I got a few hours until my girl gets home anyways and she would kill me if I started it without her haha!

[flyinlow]

Good lists.

I warmed the oil bottles in hot water before I poured them in.

ZDDP or break in lube?

burp cooling system making sure its full

Don't have car on jack stands or blocked in garage.

Assistant with fire extinguisher and bucket full of wet towels.

Advise nearby people of first start... Smoke

Good luck 

[HeavyFuel]

This is how I did mine.

http://www.dodgecharger.com/forum/index.php/topic,95015.msg1218655.html#msg1218655


Be sure to set your timing advanced enough to help keep the temps down, and don't use the tach in the dash unless your know it's accurate.  And get a BIG fan to help keep things cool.

[2Luke2]

We put in comp cams break in oil. Though we didn't add an additive in addition. We used comp cams cam and lift lube as well when we assembled. We can still see that sticky stuff on the lobes from the dizzy hole so hopefully that should be good.

We filled the radiator and then let it sit for awhile. We then jacked up he car in the front and let it sit and then plan on doing the rear as well. Just hooking up as much exhaust as we can which consists of the long tube headers and an x-pipe. The only issue we are going to have is the exhaust fumes. We will need to find a way to push them out of the garage because we backed the car into the garage not thinking about it. So 20-30min even in the open garage would probably kill us both lol. We were planning on grabbing some kind of exhaust vent or something that we could redirect the exhaust and then use fans for the rest. We have a couple big shop type fans. We have a fire extinguisher on hand as well.

We were trying to google how hot a dryer vent can get before it catches fire, but we don't know how hot the engine is going to throw out exhaust fumes. I know when we angled the exhaust a bit too high on the Challenger that it melted the plastic bumper and the rear marker lights fell out haha... Though I was doing some 30-140mph pulls so I expect the exhaust not to be that hot when we crank up and keep her around 2-3k for the 20-30 minutes, but we don't know for sure.

Thanks again for the tips!

[flyinlow]

Comp cam Break in oil is fine.

A large fan in front of the car helps keep things cool and blow fumes away.  My painted headers showed a little glow on the first bend after awhile. I was surprised.

[john108]

Prime the Carb

[2Luke2]

John, any tricks other than to suck on the line to get it to prime? I guess I could jack up the back of the car to get some few flowing. Or should I just fill the bowls in the carb or both?   

[2Luke2]

Ok this is how I primed the mech fuel pump... I jacked up the rear of the car. Opened the throttle wide open. Then opened the gas cap covered the hole with a rag and then put the tip of my air hose under the rag and put about 10-15psi in the tank. Took about 10-15 secs and boom we got fuel in the bowls.

[john108]

Luke-
You can also fill the bowls on the holley through the vent tubes.

[john108]

http://www.dodgecharger.com/forum/index.php/topic,9140.0.html

[2Luke2]

Thanks again John!

[flyinlow]

Keep an old one quart gear lube bottle full of gasoline put a piece of 3/8" hose on the tip and you can bottle feed the carbs.

[cudaken]

 I am getting ready to start my Road Runner after letting her sleep for 8 years. I have break in lube on the cam ( I pre-oiled the heck out the her and turned the motor) I PM Ron about the Zinc and he said to add it even with me changing oil after say 20 minutes of run time, so I am.

Cuda Ken

[2Luke2]

I am getting ready to start my Road Runner after letting her sleep for 8 years. I have break in lube on the cam ( I pre-oiled the heck out the her and turned the motor) I PM Ron about the Zinc and he said to add it even with me changing oil after say 20 minutes of run time, so I am.

Cuda Ken

Good luck with your startup Ken! It got too late here so we are going to do it at first light tomorrow. We should find out who all the car guys/girls are in the neighborhood when we don't see them standing outside with their pitch forks haha!!!

[2Luke2]

So we were double checking everything last night and we just want to make sure we have everything hooked up. Even though we can bump the starter with the key we aren't 100% sure we have everything hooked up correctly. I guess we are just looking for a warm fuzzy before firing her off. We were just curious if it is normal that we have extra wires after hooking in an MSD box. The reason I ask is because we hooked up the MSD box and the tach adapter and we have two extra wires that we are unsure of where they go if anywhere.

The first picture with the blue wire went to the ignition resistor and when we had the old orange box setup there was another wire that was tied into it. Now it's just a single wire with no where to go as far as we know.

The second picture with the blue wire we think came from the positive side of the coil, but we aren't sure. The grey with black tracer in the picture we think came from the negative side of the coil and that's why we have it hooked up to the violet tach adapter wire.

So the question is... should these wires be dangling or should they have a place to go after we removed the orange box and factory distributor, and installed a new Firecore distributor, MSD AL2, and Tach adapter?