Is a 80ish dodge 4 cylinder turbo motor worth having?

I had a guy stop by my shop telling me he had a running Dodge Charger 85ish? that had the turbocharged 4 cylinder in it. His son had burned up the clutch and he was pissed. Told me I could have it. These deals generally end up being more work than they are worth sometimes. Any suggestions?

 

Jump on it. those things are great. Here are some specs. notice the turbo model with 146hp and the garret turbo with 175hp. not too shabby.

Car Power Turbo Production
1983 Shelby Charger 107 none 8,521
1984 Shelby Charger 110 none 7,552
1985 Shelby Charger 110/146 none/Turbo I 7,709
1986 Shelby Charger 110/146 none/Turbo I 7,669
1987 Shelby Charger 146 Turbo I 2,011
1987 Shelby GLHS (Charger) 175 Turbo II 1,000
1984 Omni GLH 110 none 3,285
1985 Omni GLH 110/146 none/Turbo I 6,513
1986 Omni GLH 110/146 none/Turbo I 3,629
1986 Omni GLHS 175 Garret* 500

 

If it's the 2.2 they had a huge following and a bunch of speed parts were available.They were even turning some crazy times in the little dodge caravans or what ever the little vans were.It seems like there was a lot of info in hotrod,etc. over the years.

 

i think the guy at dodgegarage.com had a 10 sec k car. that thing was awesome

 

I was thinking it would be cool for a T project in the future.

 

This is true, even Mopar Performance made a lot of stuff for them and I think there were heads, cranks, pistinns, etc. i know that Comp Cams, Isky and some others make cams for them. There are some sites devoted to these engines. My wife had one in a Reliant coupe and I ran the hell out of that engine whenever I had the car and it held up Go for it!

 

I believe Mopar also made bellhousings to convert the Front drive engines for use with conventional inline drivetrains.

 

f it's a Charger it is probably just a turbo one motor. Not the fastest thing in the world but would have a decent amount of power. These 2.2L engines run forever even when highly abused. I would not have a problem saying that they can have the same reputation as a slant six. If you start it up and it's knocking that is completely normal for these engines they are pretty loud sometimes.

I would upgrade to a bigger turbo, Like maybe what came on a turbo 3 motor and drive for a work car and never wash so unsuspecting Mustangs and F-body's won't have a clue. Then blow them out of the water.

Here's a good website for the 2.2, 2.5 motors.

http://www.allpar.com/mopar/22.html

I just read on there that the 85 turbo cars make 146 HP. Not bad.
Just stay away from the carbed versions of these engines. Electronic carbs suck and they never run right.

 

Are they front wheel drive? I was under the impression that they were rear wheel drive.

I would just like to slate it for a future project. If it is running and I can just clean it up and throw it in a car that would be cool. I really don't wanna start spending a ton of $$ on it. Just a donor car.
If I have to scrap the car though, I wanna make sure it's worth the effort.

Are the motors ugly? Would I need a hood? I'm thinking so.

 

Yep just find a 87-95 Dodge Dakota. They are all 5 speeds too. I think u have to do something with the fwd flexplate or something not sure though.

 

These are about as pretty as the get.

http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=104163&highlight=2.2+race+engines

 

Some of the early 80's Dodges (TC3?) had a VW motor in them. VW recalled them and sold 'em to dodge...

 

79-83 had the 1.7 VW in the omni-Horrizen and tc3. Then they switched to a Peugeot 1.6L. Daytonas are all 2.2/2.5.

 

The kid has burned up a couple of clutches so I figure he's thrashing it pretty hard.

 

87 Dakota with carbed 2.2. I have literately blew up 2 clutches in this thing from doing burnouts and just generally acting like the 19 year old like I am. It sees 6000RPM at least twice a day I have put 60,000 on it since I was 16. It has about 190,000 on the clock. My dad bought it at 60,000 and it has always sounded like it is about to through a rod but it still keeps going. I am just now burning a quart of oil every 3,000 miles. I absolutely run the piss out of this thing. 3 sets of tires so far. O yea 20.3 second at 63 miles an hour in the quarter. It's a rocket. Will do a good 3rd gear burnout though. It blew a head gasket once. Otherwise no problems. Except that the carb is the biggest piece of shit ever.

 

I knew a kid in high school that had one of those GLHS's and that little fucker would move out!

I'd grab it & hang on to it. A free turbo motor is a free turbo motor any way you look at it. Plus, if these things have some kind of following maybe some dude on e-bay would pay a few hundred for the body.

 

Pretty sure they are front wheel drive.

If it's exactly what you've always wanted,grab it.
Otherwise,it's a latemodel shitbox.

 

A Shelby Omni GLHS (goes like hell somemore) is one of my fetish dream cars.

 

I'll tell you what to do with it. Find a Rupp Centaur and swap out the crappy snowmobile drivetrain for this.

Guy here did that with a quad 4. Runs like stink and this would likely run even better.

 

I had a '89 Daytona w/ a 2.5L as a D.D. years ago. I sold it @ 177K. It used NO oil and was still pulling 30 MPG highway. A woman bought it for her daughter to commute to school in. Last I saw of the car it had over 250K on it and was still running like a top. I always thought it was one of Dodges best engines in quite some time.

 

they like to crack the head and if the start nocking its the piston pins had an omni that i put a new head on 2 mo. later it threw a rod then and $50 short block lasted about 20 mo. drove it 120 miles a day

 

Buddy had a plain jane '85 he got in 1991 or 1992, cheap, with less than 5000 miles on it - had been a wife's second car that never got driven. He never had any real trouble with it, except it didn't get much better gas milage than my '60 Pontiac. But it probably had the small engine.

The 80s small Charger and TC3 were just a sportier body on the same platform as the Omni.

Thing with a car like this is it won't be much longer before it's eligible for AACA shows - I see people now all the time winning trophies on a budget by bringing nice original or cleaned up late '70's, early 80's rides to local shows - it might be a sign of the apocolypse, but I've seen Chevettes, Pintos, Omnis, and big late 70s GM barges all being shown. So even if you don't want to keep it, it would be a cheap way for a kid to get into showing cars -

 

Free is good......Ole Pork

 

Whoa, I can't believe anyone on the hamb has anything positive to say about those shitty half-engines. First of all if you are interested in performance and you don't have a lot of scratch you want a v8. Most stock v8s will effortlessly outperform this turbo 2.2 and they are inexpensive and easy to maintain. Second all those crappy things made in the 80's that do not deserve to be called mopar products are wrong wheel drive. Third They are notorious for blowing head gaskets! You wanna drive or wrench all day? Fourth the 80's was a tough time for almost all american cars, quality of materials used as well as craftsmanship was at an all time low! (or was that the late 70's?) and don't trust the opinion of anyone who thinks a 20 sec time slip warrants the use of the term "rocket"! This term applies to oldsmobile v8 engines or anything else that is actually fast or built by NASA! This is what a rocket looks like!

 

Put a clutch in it, sell it and move on. Next case.

Actually my best k-car story comes from Bonneville. Nebulous Theroum is a sweet little streamliner that runs a variety of small engines. A few years ago they had a 175cc (or so) Honda bike motor in it with a belt driven supercharger. Yea, these guys think outside the box. Anyway when I enquired about the supercharger they insisted they had cut the exhaust side of a k-car turbo off and attached a pulley!

I love that place.

Put a clutch in it, sell it and move on.

 

I don't want the car, just the engine.

I should have known the "Trad Police" would come out in force.

 

I just figured I could build a car on the cheap....that got decent mileage. Maybe a beater shop truck or something.

 

Hey Root, a freebie turbo engine for a little street driven T would be like a roller skate on crack!

For every issue that was wrong with those little motors there is a fix or a solution available. It just depends on whether or not you want to mess with it.

All I know is that I can do alot of work on something for free....

 

keep the whole drivetrain. the motor is good, they make lots of speed parts for them. the A525 is a pretty stout tranny with a good ratio. 14:1 steering ratio, it makes a good front wheel drive car. use the whole running gear and put it in like a track t or something light mount it it the rear use the front wheel drive stuff for the rear and fab up some independant suspention system for it. I think it would be cool, plus you could drive it everyday and not have to worry about mileage. just my $.02