So, I closed my hood for the first time since the rad was hard mounted and I heard a thud and then the hood wouldn’t close anymore. Seems the final resting place of the mounted rad hits the bottom side of the hood. %$@*&. How the eff did I screw this up! I only had one job dammit! Seems when tightened to the core support, the rubber mounts condense just enough to allow the rad cap to hit the hood. 🙁 So there was only one thing to do….rip the front end apart again as I couldn’t lean the rad any more towards the fan as I only had ¼” of clearance to start with! All in all, this killed about 2.5 months worth of weekends although we did do some other needed items along the way.
So this is the hood closed as far as it will go:
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And you can see the fresh nick in the paint where the rad cap hits: 🙁
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So, out comes the rad and the cutting began again until the rad cleared the hood.
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My buddy who has been over every weekend this year to assist with the motivation in getting this giant paperweight done is seen here with a grinder cutting rad core support out:
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But now I have a new problem. The IC ear hits the lower rad hose. Arrrrg!!! So more cutting began so the IC could be lowered 1”. That meant all mounts had to be cut off and new ones made.
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And now the ear of the IC hits the inner fender as it is lowered. %&*$ toad stools and ^%#@$ son of a seacook! So both sides of the inner fender had to be chopped.
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This is what was chopped out of the rad core support:
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So, then with so much material cut, it was time to test fit the grill! Guess what? It no longer fits as the IC hits the grill backside! Cursin screechin sufferin mother of &%#$. So the mods continued with now relocating the condenser to the front side of the IC core so the IC core can get closer to the rad and the condenser being narrower, will be relocated to the center of the IC with hopes it will clear the grill.
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After weeks of testing, it all finally sat right so a frame was made for the condenser to allow it to mount to the IC core.
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Mounting the condenser to the frame:
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And the soldering was done for the Freon lines that logically had to be cut off and remade.
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And then paint was added to the fresh copper lines and the brass mount block was polished so it looked purdy.
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This is a great picture to show clearance between the two cores when in the truck:
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Next up it was time to deal with the cold air intake. Much like the 1990, I did not want to be sucking hot under hood air. As every 1 degree F of intake plenum temp is equivalent to 3 deg F on the pyro side, 50 deg cooler air from your intake makes 150 F cooler EGTs so that allows that much more fuel before you reach your peak pyro number. So the cutting began again. The scoop by the way is off the top of a cabover semi. That is the air intake scoop mounted upside down. The scoop is 7” and needs to be necked down to 5” to get past the gen 1 fender crossmembers. So I used a duct adapter and modified it, then reinforced it, then added silicon to seal it, followed by rocker guard.
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Test fit with bumper to ensure it sits level and hangs below. Also a good check to make sure the 19.5 tire clears. I have a total of 1” with bags deflated.
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A look on the inside:
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Scoop is then cut to make it work and look better when mounted upside down:
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Then the support straps are made to make it solid. At this point the duct goes for rocker guarding (stronger than powder coating for an area that will be stone blasted).
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Next was priming and painting, again. This pic shows a great look at what areas were modified.
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Here is the pile of brackets that came back for powder coating. I don’t have photos of it but the light bar, the battery support, and the rad brackets being made but they are in that pile along with the other parts like the condenser frame that you have already seen.
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Now that the parts are back from powder, assembly begins:
Light bar:
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Light wiring:
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Condenser and IC:
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Fan is mounted and ready. Strap is the antirotation strap required for the electronic lockup of the Horton fan clutch.
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Next the valence is installed. It is a JUST fit now that the condenser is on the front of the IC.
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She is TIGHT. REALLY tight! I have about 1/8” clearance. The black marker indicates the original area I was going to have to cut out to make it fit. Gives you an idea of how much room I saved by mounting the condenser on the front. Also will allow better cooling efficiency for the AC as the air will be cooler vs the semi hot air coming from the IC onto the condenser core.
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And lastly rad and modified fan shroud:
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One last test with the old insert less grill so I can see how much clearance I have on the condenser. As you can see, just a few fins needed to be bent out of the way to clear the grill! Unreal!
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Bumper:
Next up, fresh out of the Mopar packages, the front bumper emerged!
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And it was assembled:
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Next is the battery tray. As the wider rad requires more space, it requires the battery tray to move. It was decided to mount the battery tray more or less the same place as factory but that required new mounts and more reinforcement as the tray to fender support rod would be gone, as would the fender bolting supports as the new tray location is set down and over further.
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That’s the end that gets cut out:
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New mounting and support brackets get welded on:
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This is how it sits on the truck:
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Note the original mounting location:
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Magically fabricated and painted, the new support rod goes under the tray to help support the 65 lbs group 31 battery.
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Freshly painted tray:
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And the tray installed:
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And lastly, the battery!
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