Yesterday I cranked up my Dart and took it on the road for the first time in over two years. My rather crude intake tubing - something that's only on there until I get my intercooler in - didn't hold up too well, and the exhaust scrapes the pavement on low spots, but it's running better right out of the box than I could get that beat up old Holley running after a month of tuning.

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"Mad Scientist" Matt Cramer
'66 Dart - turbocharged 225
My blog - Mad Scientist Matt's Lair

Keep us posted Matt!

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Yeah....Im the one who destroyed this rare, vintage automobile.....

Describe your system Matt. I'm glad you didn't have the teeth cutting problems I experienced.
Sam

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Well, mine did have a few teething problems - some leaks in the fuel system (note: I am never using inverted flares in aluminum fuel line again!), electrical noise, a couple loose wires, and some weird issues with the wideband sensor (mostly with its wiring and its refusal to talk to the computer; the sensor and controller are just fine). Here's the basics of my system:

For an ECU, I have a Megasquirt V2.2 (I started before the V3 came out) with the HEI modifications and MSnS-E firmware.

The intake is an older Clifford piece modified by a local machine shop that installed injector bungs, made a fuel rail, and built an adapter for a Ford 4.6 throttle body.

The injectors are rebuilt 440 cc/min Toyota Supra units run with their resistor pack.

The fuel system uses a Summit low pressure fuel pump, a surge tank made from a Goldenrod industrial fuel filter, a Carter high pressure pump of the same sort originally used on late '80s Ford trucks, and an MSD adjustable fuel pressure regulator. As I intend to take it to drag events, there's only a few inches of rubber line at the very beginning; all the rest is AN -6 hose or 3/8" hard line. The fuel system was by far the most work.

I'm running a Lean Burn distributor and a 7-pin HEI module with an Accel Super Stock coil.

Still have that same TE04 turbo and the cut and welded manifold from Wayne's article on this site (I bought them when he sold the car). Right now the boost control is a crude bleed, but I plan on converting it to the Megasquirt electronic boost control soon.

Another mod I plan to add very soon is an intercooler - this intake plumbing on it right now is only going to stay until I get the intercooler installed (I already have one, just need to fab up some mounting brackets and figure out how I'll route the plumbing). After that, I may need to add a bigger turbo - the TE04 really seems a bit on the small side for this motor.

You can see a few pictures of it here on my blog.

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"Mad Scientist" Matt Cramer
'66 Dart - turbocharged 225
My blog - Mad Scientist Matt's Lair

Great job Matt! Thank you for keeping your blog updated with your information. It's very valuable to have such good write ups on projects.

What did you do to mate the 7 pin HEI module to the lean burn distributor?

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Yeah....Im the one who destroyed this rare, vintage automobile.....

From an electrical standpoint, a Lean Burn distributor is virtually identical to a GM distributor with computer controlled timing, only the wires are different colors. I took a set of junkyard GM connectors and spliced the green module wire to the black wire on the Mopar pickup, and the white module wire to the orange pickup wire. The rest of it I wired according to this write-up. The Megasquirt controls the timing.

If I were to do this over again, I'd probably use a Megasquirt with the V3 board and control the coil directly. It's a bit less work, but the V3 board wasn't out when I started. Of course, now I suppose I could upgrade to one of the high performance HEI modules out there, but I suspect if I do any more ignition work, I'll be adding some sort of capacitive discharge box.

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"Mad Scientist" Matt Cramer
'66 Dart - turbocharged 225
My blog - Mad Scientist Matt's Lair

Thanks Matt!

I take it you mounted the module externally?

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Yeah....Im the one who destroyed this rare, vintage automobile.....

Chuck the distributor all together and add ford edis.... can be had on the cheap with junkyard parts, only tricky part will be mounting wheel/sensor. I grabbed the module/coil/sensor from junkyard, bought wheel from napa new, just have to get around to mounting the whole mess and modifying the v2.2 board, or will probably upgrade to MS2/V3 at same time.

That all sounds pretty interesting. I wish I knew as much about the various ignition options as you guys apparently know. The thing is, as I have found out, any little change, and things must all be coordinated again. There is a real avalanche effect in this arena.

My fuel set up is almost identical to yours, except I feed the draw side of the fuel filter/surge tank with the stock mechanical pump. The high pressure pump is on the feed side of the filter/ surge tank. It all works pretty well, except it does take up a fair mount of space under the hood.

Keep us up to date.
Sam

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Yup, deffinatley stabalize things the way they are first before any further tinkering.

Check this out for a surge tank idea, nifty and saves some space as pump is IN the surgetank... http://www.geocities.com/hrayhouston/antisurgetank.html

Wow, that's brilliant. I'll definetly bookmark that for when I do my EFI build.

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Used to own:
'82 Dodge D150
Erson 270 Cam, O/S valves, mild port work, ~9.5:1 compression

Currently fighting with an '85 VW Cabriolet

My other passion

Matt,

Many congrats on your running vehicle. Best of luck with the tuning - now the fun begins!

Lou

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Home of Slant6-powered fun machines since 1988