Gents My Wife is restoring a 1938 Dodge D10 4dr sedan and we're looking at upading a few items. One of the main items that we want to address is the bakes. As it stands now we need special tools to adjust the stock brakes...apparently We'd like to keep the stock engine but upgrade the transmission to a 4 speed or 5 speed. A little help would be appreciated
Poke around in here a little: http://mopar.pairserver.com/p15d24ph_forum/index.php?/index/ There are a few threads about putting a 5 speed behind a flatty along with a lot of other helpful info
P15D24 board used to be good, lately they "improved" it to the point where I can't even look at it. But it might be worth a shot. Don't sweat the adjustment. There is a "major adjustment" that only needs to be done after a brake job or shoe replacement. It is not that big a deal, it means aligning the shoes to the drums. If you don't have the factory tool you can make your own from wood and a piece of allthread. It also helps to contour the shoes to fit the drums, using a sanding block. Once the new brakes are aligned, you only need to do a "minor adjustment" once a year or so to take up wear. The factory manual has all the gory details. Here is a thread from P15D24 showing different home made adjustment gauges. http://mopar.pairserver.com/p15d24ph_forum/index.php?/topic/18910-brake-adjustment/
If you get the original engine running good you should have no trouble about the trans. I know a guy who had the same idea regarding his 41 Dodge coupe. He had the engine rebuilt and that took away all desire to do any changes to the transmission. The old Chrysler built flatheads are foolers. They will continue to start and run without protest, and without any bad knocks or bangs in an advanced state of wear. They just lose power, and eventually get hard to start. Do a compression test, your engine when new had about 110 psi. If it is below 90 or if some cylinders are low it is time for an overhaul or rebuild. If not too many miles are on it a "ring and valve job" may be in order. This means grinding the valves and replacing the piston rings without taking the engine out of the car. If more than 50,000 miles, or if oil pressure is less than 40 PSI @ 30 MPH you may need a complete rebuild. This does not have to be very difficult or expensive, it is a simple engine and parts are readily available and cheap.
Chrysler mechanicals were good for their age - they had hydralic brakes prior to Ford , were well advanced in the design and when adjusted were a good brake for their time. I converted my 35 Desoto drums (similar to your 38 Dodge) to discs cause the front drums had literally worn out and had lost their tolerance. I did not regret the change over however if the brake drums had still been within tolerance I would have run them longer
The entire brake sysytem is in need of love- master cylinder, lines etc the rear drums are close to okish but the fronts are cooked. The driveshaft doesn't have it's rubber boots anymore and fires grease at a high speed all over the underside of the car until its empty..was kind of funny when it first happened but now it's a pain
Check with Rusty Hope for a disk brake conversion, he's a member here. The stock drums do work ok in good condition, but the parts are hard (and expensive!) to find, and after all that work you'll have spend as much as you'd have needed to convert to disks. Plus, if the car is intended to be a driver, the disks will be a good safety improvement. Later model transmissions aren't that difficult to adapt to a flatty, there's a few kits out there for doing it and more than a few folks over at P15D24 that have done it. Not that the flatty can't make the power, but the gearing for freeway speeds just isn't there. With a new transmission a new driveshaft should be in order, which will solve another issue for you. I'm not entirely sure on the width of the rear end, but I know that on my '37 Dodge truck its pretty close to an early B body 8 3/4. If you're keeping the flathead 6 that will be overkill, you could also look to see if you could find an 8 1/4. Or find a donor from whatever vehicle you get a transmission from, I'd guess that the smaller trucks (Dakota, S10, Ranger) would be fairly close in rear end dimensions.
I agree with moparmonkey, a disc swap will cure the braking issues up front and a rear swap is easily undone if needed. There are several ways to get a 5-speed behind the I6; check the thread "5-speed, not t5" (www.p15-d24.com) for a very inexpensive change. .
Discs up front is where we'd like to go, but I can't find the member you're speaking of. A few around here have suggested an s10 frame swap but I don't really want to go that way just to improve the brakes and gearing
Driveshaft boots: check out Andy Bernbaum's, they'll have any mechanical parts you need. You could rebuild the stock driveshaft or go to a local driveshaft shop and have a new one built. I'm running '34 Plymouth running gear in my "T" and had a drive shaft built for it. The guy had the ends with the 4-bolt flange, that adapts the trans and rear to modern U-joints, on the shelf, apparently there are 2 popular sizes for these flanges that have been used for the past 70 yrs! He put a slider joint like on 3/4 ton pick-ups in it, works great, cost ~$300 a few years ago. Brakes: Disks are the way to go but if you don't like their look (seeing the discs through the wheels) then I would upgrade to Bendix style brakes. I'm not aware of any bolt on swaps. I'm currently working on replacing the '34 brakes, in all four corners, with 60's falcon/mustag/ranchero 9 x 2 1/4" drums, cheap and plentiful. The idea is to cut the center of the stock backing plates out and weld them to the falcon backing plates, will post more when I figure it out. Kipp
No need at all to "upgrade" those brakes. The adjustments, if done correctly, will stop that car on a dime........well....o.k.....a quarter. I never made the special tool. I learned to adjust those as a kid without any special tool.
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