I dropped the 318 in the truck today and came to realize the oil pan was the wrong one!!!it must be from an older ram i think...after kicking everything in sight and breaking mylittle toeduring mytantrum i went to the parts store andgot a new one on the way and it should be here on monday. so it looks like next weekend now.

 

it will be soooooo worth it in the end

 

That sucks man.
I've been having some really bad luck with the truck lately. Took it out to test the new trans, found out the water pump is leaking. Replaced that yesterday. Than, after replacing that, now it will turn over, but not start. Fuel pump primes, pressing the schrader valve sends fuel out. No spark (on the cylinder wires or the coil-to-distributor). Battery is brand new (although, from AutoZone). Replaced the coil (because I thought it was bad, but evidently my diagnostics was wrong, or... since it was 9pm and only AutoZone was open, the new part is bad too?)
I still have a flow-chart the follow, but I have to leave today. It looks more and more like I'll be using my friends Monte Carlo for a while. And who knows when I'll be able to get back up here again. Probably a month and a half.

 

Welcome to the world of engine swapping.. hehe. Nothing will go as planned and you will more often than not spend more money than you originally planned.

 

I'm planning on getting a 318 for my truck but it sounds like I don't want to do it myself.
Did your new engine come from a dak or a ram?
I found a 318 from a ram but I'm trying to get one from a 2wd dak so I can get the CPU also.
Well, Good luck and I hope you feel it was all worth it in the end.

 

yea, i know it will be worth it and it is really not that bad. dodgerules, i know this sounds silly but i have seen it happen on two 3.9 dakotas before, have you checked the coil wire terminals? try giving them a squeez and putting it back on! It happened to mine in the middle of the road and when i touched it once, and on another on we had in the shop. it is worth a try! And onebadkota, you are exactly right!!!!!!! it started out thinking i could do it pretty cheap and it seems to be getting more and more each day!!! but hopefully the pan will be here tomorrow and i can throw it in and hook everything up in the middle of the week!

 

I was hoping to do mine for less than 1,500 including buying the motor. Boy was I WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY off... lol

 

same here, but i am at about 2,000 so far!!! and i know once it gets that extra power and torque it will break some stuff, since every thing in the drive line is original down to the u-joints and has 181,000 miles on it!!!

 

Don't underestimate that rearend. I'm finally redoing my 3.21 pegleg with 150k+ on it and I beat the hell out of it. With the torque on mine, I only managed to blowout the U-joint on the end of the driveshaft.


The rear end still feels like new.

 

ha ha thats funny cause i've been going through a parts house hell too!!! First they didn't give me good pistons lost like 30$ there then Wrong headers no EGR hookup lost 50$ there then recently wrong piston rings with the kit then went to my auto teacher to get some for from his guy but then they were the wrong ones to! But im up to probley 1,900$-2,000$ but i finally think im set