I have been looking for a 1970 Plymouth Sportfury for many years now. Most of the ones that I have come across were 4-door 318 cars with a lot, I mean a LOT of rust and high price tags. One night while driving on a back street in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho I spotted a Gold '70 2-door Fury III Fastback Coupe sitting on the side of the road. I went back and looked at it. The body was 95% straight with only one spot of rust on the right front fender. I wrote down the phone number on the FOR SALE sign and called it the next day. The guy on the phone told me that he had sold the car a week ago. A bit discouraged, I decided to go back and take another look at the car just for the hell of it. When I got there I spoke to the lady that owned the car. She told me she had bought the car the week prior and that her husband had already pulled the engine and transmission out to put in their Duster. She than told me that I could have the car if I wanted it. So I went home and got the car hauler and that begins the adventure of my 1970 Fury.
When the weather got nicer in April I started checking out the car more closely to see what kind of shape she was really in. The car has been repainted once but I couldn't find any evidence of any accident damage. I opened the glove box and found all the registration slips and maintenance reciepts. The car was bought new in Spokane, Wa and was owned by that person up until 1996. He than sold the car to someone in Athol, Idaho. That person kept the car up until he sold it to the lady the ripped the engine and transmission out of it.
I didn't get a trunk key with the car so I had a locksmith friend of mine come over and pick the lock. To my surprise there was an engine in the trunk. I couldn't tell because the car wasn't sitting any lower in the rear than normal. We pulled the engine out of the trunk to look at it. I thought it was just a 318. But upon closer look it was a 340. This must have been the engine that came out of the duster? The engine looked fine externally. So we decided to take it apart for a closer look. The only thing wrong with the engine was that it had a blown headgasket. So let's get this straight. Someone owns a duster with a 340 and blows the head gasket. Instead of fixing the engine they buy a 1970 Fury and take the 318 out of it and put in there Duster. Whats wrong with this picture???
After much debating over whether to rebuild the 340 or not I decided I really wanted a big block. I guess one big block car isn't enough! (I have a 1966 Plymouth Sportfury with 383) I loaded the 340 in my truck and went to visit one of my MOPAR buddies. He had lots of big blocks and wanted the 340 for one of his A-body projects. I had my choice of many 383,400, and 440 bigblocks. However, they just weren't what I wanted. Than he showed me a complete 413 with 727 transmission. Now that's what I was looking for. We made the deal and I hauled off the engine that the Beach Boys sang about! (even if it did lose to a fuel injected stingray)
I decided to pull that 413 out of the shed and have a look at it. Upon further inspection I found it was a 413 from a 1971 dodge motorhome and that there were a few small differences. I made a few phone calls and determined that the block and crank were still suitable for what I wanted to build. So I stripped the engine of unnecessary things like the carburetor, cast iron intake, waterpump housing, exhaust manifolds and cylinder heads and sold them on e-bay.
The block was then taken to a machine shop for further disassembly and inspection. Everything was good! I decided that I really wanted to have a 426 wedge built for the car. Everyone has a 440! So I had the block bored to the 426 specs and had new pistons,a MOPAR purple cam and the works installed. I'm still deciding on the heads to use but I have decided to use the Holley Projection 950 Commander set up on a Mopar M1 Single Plane Aluminum Intake for fuel delivery. A fuel injected 426 wedge, that ought to turn a few heads! The burned gasses will exit through a set of factory hi-po exhaust manifolds (purchased on E-bay) and 2 1/2" dual pipes.
I changed my mind about the Mopar M1 Intake and purchased a used Edelbrock Torker intake. I liked the numbers that this intake produces over the M1. I also found a set of factory disc brakes in the wrecking yard on a 1970 Chrysler 300. I purchased the whole brake set up for $100.00. I now have to take them down to the shop I work at and start the cleaning process. Now the car has the brakes to go with the new engine.
I took the disc brake set up down to work and started to clean them up. First a bath in the parts washer to remove 20 years of dirt and crud. Than I completely disassembled them and cleaned them futher with the bead blaster. I turned the rotors on the tru-turn lathe and they looked new again. I replaced the bearings and races. I rebuilt the calipers and installed a set of NOS pads. I painted the whole works with POR-15 rust preservative (except the braking surface on the rotors) than topped it with a coat of POR-15 Chassis black.
Today I decided to install the disc brakes on the car, or so I thought. Removing the drum brake set up was easy enough. But, the spindles turned out to be a whole different story. The tie rod ends and ball joints didn't want to separate. I ended up removing the upper and lower control arms with the spindle still attached. After purchasing several different pullers and pickle forks I finally found one that worked. Six hours after I started the right side spindle was finally off.
Not wanting to put the control arms back in all rusty and dirty I cleaned them up in the bead blaster and painted them with the POR-15 rust preservative topped with a coat of POR-15 Chassis Black. I than had the upper ball joint replaced by a local shop because I didn't have the proper ball joint socket. I also had the upper control arm bushings pressed out at the same time.
I got the right upper control arm back with the new ball joint and bushings installed. I went to put it back together but ran into a few more delays. Someone had told me I should put a camber kit in while I had the upper control arm off. So I spent a half a day driving around Spokane, Washington before I found what I was looking for. I got back to Coeur d' Alene with about an hour of sunlight left. I got the upper control arm and camber kit in before darkness hit.
I got up bright and early determined to get the brakes finished today. I got the spindle installed and the rotor attached in about an hour. I went to install the caliper and found the rubber brake line was pretty weather cracked. Can't have new disc brakes without new brake lines. (I learned that lesson on my dad's 1956 Ford Fairlane when one of the brake hoses blew on me while stopping at a rather large intersection in Albuquerque) I found a set of front brake hoses in Spokane so off I went. Two hours later I was back and ready to go. I had the caliper and new hose on by 2:00 in the afternoon. At that point I noticed the tie rod ends were loose, and the tie rod sleeve was bent. So back to the parts store. This time I didn't have to go to Spokane. The local Schucks store had both tie rod ends and sleeve. I got home and started to put them on when I decided that they needed a coat of POR-15 and Chassis Black.
Finally, another day off to work on the Fury project. I retrieved the freshly painted tie rod ends and sleeve and put them together. I got ready to install them on the car but noticed the idler arm had excessive play. No one between Coeur d'Alene and Spokane had an Idler arm in stock. So I went online and ordered one. While online I found a "close-ratio" Police power steering unit for a fury. Well, I just couldn't resist so I ordered that too.
I finally received the power steering unit and idler arm from Florida. I unpacked and painted them for installation at a later date. I had spotted a 1970 Sportfury on one of my earlier trips to Spokane so I decided to go look at it today. I thought I could use it for a parts car and to convert my to a "sportfury" clone. The car was extremely rough, a four door, and the owner wanted $1500.00. I guess this parts car would have to wait for another day.
I installed the idler arm and connected the tie rod ends. I now have a car that steers again even it still doesn't have an engine installed. Finally, a month and a half after I started I got the right disc brake set up completely installed. I guess I'll save the left side to do for later. So as it sits I have disc brakes on the right and drum brakes on the left. That would make it interesting to drive.
I really liked the hide-away headlights on the Sportfury so off to Spokane I went determined to buy that 1970 4-door Sportfury sitting by the highway. After an hour of negotiating with the owner the price was still at $1500.00. That was too much to spend for hide-away headlights.
While searching on ebay for a part for my '66 Sportfury I came across a hide-away headlight set up for the 1970 Fury that was mislabeled. I placed the minimum bid and waited all week to see if anyone else would stumble across them. I have seen three other hide-away headlight set ups go through for $400-$550. I kept my fingers crossed.
Today was a good day!!! No one else discovered the Hide-away headlight set up on ebay. I got the whole works for $99.00 plus $10.00 shipping.
I found a front sway bay on a '69 Chrysler 300. I borrowed a torch and cut the mounts off of the frame and welded them onto the frame of my Fury. I ordered some new moog bushings for the strut rods and the sway bars. Once intalled the sway bar should give the car much better handling.
I found a used '77 440 police interceptor motor today in the wrecking yard. I was able to purchase it for $75.00. I took it apart and found that it had a blown headgasket on the right cylinder bank and the cylinder walls were rusted bu all else was good. I dropped it off at the local machine shop to have checked out. He said the cylinders could be bored .030 over and the block would still be good. I think I'll build the 440 for the car and put the 413 that I bought earlier in the year in my dodge powerwagon.