challenger71

I have an oportunity to purchase a 1978 440 complete motor with an automatic transmission for $600.00 My question is I want a 440 for my 71 chally but am not sure if there are a lot of differences in the 71 440's and the 78 440's. Did they make any differences in the blocks between those years? Is there anything special I need to do to make it work?

1 Bad Mirada

i am pretty sure that the 440 in the later years will take all of the performance parts of the early 440s...did it come out of a truck/van?

kelly

I actually rebuilt a 1978 440 engine for my 1958 Dodge, and had a cable shift 727 out of a '62 300...There were a few differences, though.

The later 440s had a cast crank as opposed to the forged crank. These motors were externally balanced, as opposed to the earlier motors that were internally balanced. The later motors had 452 heads which IMHO are just as good, if not better than the 906 heads everyone raves about.

The Cast crank motors were thinner walled as well-the waterjacket was in turn, larger. The harmonic balancers were different in the two cranks...

The water pump exited on different sides, I put a high-flow Mopar Performance water pump that exited on the correct side for my Dodge.

The flexplate/Torque converter were different, and not interchangable. I had to get my '62 Torque Converter balanced to fit my '78 soft crank motor.

Despite some misgivings about the engines, I liked mine. I had no problems with it, and despite being a 'smogger' motor, I embrassed smaller faster cars with my befinned land-yacht!

Yes, all the B-R/B speed parts are very interchangable. I actually took the 452 heads to the bench grinder to make my 4-bolt 350-361 valve covers fit! ( That was the only wierd thing I did)

I had a MP purple cam, .425 lift, split 280 duration.

challenger71

Well, I ended up not getting the 78 440. It came out of a truck. I instead, purchased a 72 440 HP block that is bored .030 over and it came with a set of 396 heads. I may scrap the heads and just go with a new set of Indy heads. I only paid $500 and the block is clean and only needs to be honed. I purchased it from a buddy that has a few different blocks. i now need to send it off to the machine shop to have the cam bearings installed and honed. Plus I need to figure out what crank I need. I am trying to get 550 hp out of this motor when I am done. I just wish Christmas was a bit later cause I have to wait until after to be able to afford all of this. talk to you all soon.

AmericanMuscleCarRev

You are cool either way. The truck block could have had a steel crank, you can tell if it has a normal looking harmonic balancer instead of the cast cranks bevelled one.

Either way, shop for a set of 915 big valve heads on Ebay. Half the price of the Eddys and just as much bump.

Spend the savings on a cam, headers and carb.

If you have the dough, get the stroker from 440source.com for $1299. You can't beat it! It's a better investment than Eddy heads.

Even if you have to use the smogger heads for a while, the bottom end will be done and you'll have a rock solid foundation!



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