hi Im new to this site but not to mopars. I am rebuilding my dads 98 dodge ram pickup truck( i know not the coolest ride around but it was his, he passed away last year) from the ground up. I am wanting to build this as reliable daily driver with some @#$. Im hoping to recieve some help on ideas with the magnum engine. To me they are great building ground but I am still learning all the ins and outs about them. Any ideas on heads, pistons, cam setup, fuel injection would be greatly appreciated.
low budget magnum motor. any ideas?
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It all depends on what you really want to do with it, and how much you want to spend.
A good "freshining" rebuild would suit most needs. Unless you are going to change the heads, even a small cam is a waste of time IMO. The heads are very limited in stock form. And the stock castings are prone enough to cracking, that porting the stockers is a potential waste of time as well.
The biggest changes that I could recommend to you would be the following:
M1 2bbl intake. This gets rid of the leak prone factory beer barrel intake. Not a cheap manifold, but worth the price.
Ported stock TB or a billet 50mm TB. Many places for these, helps getting the air in.
1.7 Roller rocker conversion. I would say go with Harland Sharpe non adjustable's, as they are pretty much a bolt on and go setup, and will help build a little more torque
Headers will help, but are not a must.
To get the most out of the current setup, I would recommend a SCT tune. This can get even more potential out of your current combo, and will help maximize the benifits of the above changes.
That list will add 40-50 ftlbs of torque across a pretty broad band, and make the truck drive much better, with more reliable long term performance, and give nothing up in terms of longevity.
Danno
A good "freshining" rebuild would suit most needs. Unless you are going to change the heads, even a small cam is a waste of time IMO. The heads are very limited in stock form. And the stock castings are prone enough to cracking, that porting the stockers is a potential waste of time as well.
The biggest changes that I could recommend to you would be the following:
M1 2bbl intake. This gets rid of the leak prone factory beer barrel intake. Not a cheap manifold, but worth the price.
Ported stock TB or a billet 50mm TB. Many places for these, helps getting the air in.
1.7 Roller rocker conversion. I would say go with Harland Sharpe non adjustable's, as they are pretty much a bolt on and go setup, and will help build a little more torque
Headers will help, but are not a must.
To get the most out of the current setup, I would recommend a SCT tune. This can get even more potential out of your current combo, and will help maximize the benifits of the above changes.
That list will add 40-50 ftlbs of torque across a pretty broad band, and make the truck drive much better, with more reliable long term performance, and give nothing up in terms of longevity.
Danno
Thanks for your input. As of right now i am planning on going with a set of magnum Indy x heads. As far as the intake goes I'm working on something special. So I'm not gonna worry about that until all the final machine work is done on it. I will be running a set of headers on the truck. And the block will be baked bored honed and balanced. I'm just looking for cam ideas and piston ideas. Oh I'm only going .030 over.
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4,262 Posts
Ah gotcha.
Doing any portwork on the heads? The best way to make power on the magnums is to make sure that you have as tight a quench as possible. I just finished a 360 magnum for a friend, that has ported Mopar RT heads on it, and we went zero deck on the piston. This thing is a torque monster with that setup. Now the negative is that ANY sort of larger cam, to get the most out of the motor, you will also need to source a stall convertor ( unless you have a stick truck that is... ) Even the factory cam saw good gains when a "factory histall" type of convertor was utilized. So make sure you put that in your planning as well. Cam size and desired RPM range are going to dictate which convertor you need. So what RPM do you want this thing to go to? As far as pistons go, you can pretty much use whatever you want. As long as you arent planning on going blown/turbo'd or nitrous, hypereutectic style pistons work great.
Danno
Im definetly looking for quite a bit of torque. The truck has 3.55 gears in it right now. I will be changing them out for a set of 3.92 gears. I would go all the way up to 4.10 but I'm not planning in putting 37" tires on it. Not sure of my exact rpm ranges yet. Ive never been one for building a low rpm engine for a truck unless it was a cummins for pulling. I used to do a lot of mud racing and when the other guys where out there with there 460's and valves floating. I always stayed with a 318 screaming high r's. They always treated me right. But I'm not looking to get 7,000 rpm outa this motor either so I'm in a new learning curve.
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