Rad Rally (Dodge) Raider (akaMonteroakaPajero) Build

Well, nothing too big to say at the moment. I pulled the IM, as noted. That gave me the opportunity to better seat/tighten the coolant hoses and pull the fuel rail. With that all unhooked, I was able to check all the injector wiring. Full 12v from the firewall connector, 12v to all the injectors, but the wiring connectors on the harness-side all look pretty corroded and was getting a bit of intermittent signals on a couple of them. So I spent some time with cleaner and little teeny slips of sandpaper to clean them all out and add some dielectric grease. After doing that got better voltage it seemed, though I still think the #2 injector itself is the problem. But at least I ruled out wiring issues, I think. Also re-wrapped any cracked wire tubing.

While it was sitting there, I took the intake tube and spent some time on it with Shin-Etsu, which is a (OEM Honda) rubber restoration product. It works pretty well. Half done:

All done:

So with my shelf almost empty, it moved back to its old place and the rolling workbench is all that's left with parts on it (and mostly stuff just removed with the IM). I have a few things on the way, as well as some speakers for the rear sides and door speakers (which I need to cut holes for in the panels). 

Can't say I did much today on the truck. A few little things not worth documenting, really. I did take a few minutes to install the A/C compressor, which I had left off when putting the engine in, and attaching the lines with new nitrile o-rings. Once I did that, figured what the hell, might as well see if the system is leaking or not, for future reference (A/C will the pretty much the last thing I do on this, mechanically).  The Black Raider, according to the P/O, had working A/C before the engine was pulled, and since he maintained stuff I had no reason to doubt it.

But, the compressor had sat out in the weather and was seized up, so it got trashed. The Blue Raider (never tested the A/C) had a compressor that, for what it's worth, felt fine and wasn't seized. So that's the one I installed. Then, going to test with my manifold gauges....crap. The high-pressure port is on the line and it was clear the P/O had done a R-134 conversion on it on the Black Raider (which also makes me hope he did other necessary things for the conversion). But the low-pressure port is on the compressor itself, and that was off the Blue Raider that had not had such a conversion. So, in spite of stay-at-home stuff, I made a quick trip to the local parts store, which was a ghost town. Gave me an excuse to drive the Porsche anyhow..

On a normal day, this parking lot would be packed, since there's a supermarket, Office Depot, pet store, and large gym there. Not these days...(the Legacy is a the manager of the parts store). 

So picked up the conversion fitting for the compressor and put that on

And set up the vacuum pump and pulled vacuum to clear an moisture from the system. After running it for a few minutes to get a good vac, sealed up the valves and I'll probably let it sit for a day or two to confirm if there are any leaks or not

So yeah, that's it for today. Some stuff coming in over the next few days should provide a few small projects.

Only two minor things to report today on the Raider:

1) After 24 hours, AC system still holding full vacuum. So, I'll probably get a new dryer and charge it up and see if the compressor is good at some point (new compressors aren't very expensive anyhow). Not that AC is a big need for a vehicle like this, but it's nice to have when you want it. All my old cars have A/C except the rally car...

2) Got some fine-thread nuts in from McMaster so was able to button up the exhaust back to the back of the cat. Because when engine checking it's best not to have exhaust leaks forward of the O2.

Otherwise, spent the afternoon at a very emptyish Lowes picking up some wood for a deck project I'm about to start in my free time.

Having a 16' trailer is convenient when picking up 16' decking boards. My estimation is i picked up 1,100lbs of wood today, loaded it in three carts, busted my ass pushing it to the loading area and loading it solo. I could have asked the Lowes people, but man, those guy look pretty burned out and figured I'd just do it myself to save them the lifting late in the day. I may regret that decision tomorrow morning lol...

That's why i love going to menards for the drive through lumber yard, only have to load it once.

EvanB (Forum Supporter) said:

That's why i love going to menards for the drive through lumber yard, only have to load it once.

There's a lumber yard 3 miles from me that I've bought from in the past, but the same wood was about $60 more (i put together my order there first), and I had to get other stuff that I couldn't get at the lumber yard, so figured I'd do it all in one trip. In this area, all the wood is coming from the same mill anyhow. 

I didn't so much as touch a vehicle today.

But I did build a deck, by myself, in about 8-9 hours....so that's something I worthwhile :)

I like that your boards are at a jaunty angle

Opti said:

I like that your boards are at a jaunty angle

That's the way our entire upper deck is, And it was built by a very well known (locally) long-time builder. Doing it in diagonals like that actually saves a lot of excess material, since you eventually end up using even the short pieces you cut off at the end of the long pieces. 

that said it definitely makes it a little more complicated when you have to cut out areas for the upper deck legs as in my case, plus all the diagonal cuts you have to do. I did a lot of work with my jigsaw.

 Very nice, as above I like the look of the boards at 45 degrees ... how's your back after using the drop saw on the ground? Getting up and down and up and down kills mine so thank heavens for saw horses. Jigsaw for the birdmouths is good, a compound mitre saw is even better

cheers

R

RichardNZ said:

 Very nice, as above I like the look of the boards at 45 degrees ... how's your back after using the drop saw on the ground? Getting up and down and up and down kills mine so thank heavens for saw horses. Jigsaw for the birdmouths is good, a compound mitre saw is even better

cheers

R

I used a mitre saw for straight cuts, but mine isn't compound so didn't have the reach for the diagonal cuts. That would have made things a lot easier for sure - just not worth the expense to buy one just to save myself a bit of soreness lol. Probably something I should have bought years ago but for some reason never did, I just improv with what I have :)

minor note: the boards are actually closer to 30-35 degrees in order to maximize wood usage with the 16-foot planks (the deck is around 16' x 10'). I basically just used the same angle as the deck above it, which is similar proportions (but longer and wider)

Ok, so back to the Raider!

Rockauto delivered my injectors today....and they're not right. So that was super-annoying. 

So I pulled the other injectors back out and decided to actually clean and check them for flow, which I neglected to do completely before. So got them hooked up to a battery, fab'd up a little "pressure plug" to slip over the end with a straw from a can of carb cleaner, and ran that through while looking at the spray pattern. Five of them had a nice fan spray with no restrictions. The sixth one initially had a wonky spray-out so I backflushed it and then tried again, which took care of the issue. Must have been a little bit of debris in it. Then cleaned all the contacts on the connector part again as well. 

Then I put it all back together.

Side note: the corner of the Raider's hood and the sharp/angled latch are the perfect height to impale my head while working in the engine bay. I must have hit my head 20 times on this thing in the last month. Finally thought to "pad" it lol

So, all back together. So since the misfire issue I checked all the injector wiring and cleaned all the connectors on the harness and the injectors, cleaned the injectors, and got new plug wires. And here is the result:

So yeah, that sounds a hell of a lot better :) Didn't run it long since it's in the garage and no exhaust, so it was quickly getting cough-worthy in there, but it's smooth and no sign of the misfire. Now I can fine-tune the timing and do the other little stuff to make it purr. Anyhow, pretty happy with it now, I was getting a bit nervous.

Then moved on to my other delivery - some replacement speakers. You audio types won't be impressed, since these are pretty basic Kenwoods, but I don't need a hardcore soundsystem in this thing, just decent sound not four blown speakers:

So, easy fit into the rear b-pillar boxes (6 1/2")

The stock fronts are like 3 1/2" or 4" speakers in panels behind the lower dash. Lousy sound, tough to find a replacement that fits correctly since they're oval-shaped oddballs. Decided to relocate to the doors. The door frames have a speaker cutout but to my knowledge these never came with speakers there. Using them meant taking off my door panels and pulling back the fabric/upholstery and cutting new holes, then doing a bit of minor drilling and cutting of the steel frame.

Also had to run wires. The door wire loom as still there, but just cut off since I removed all the power locks/windows. So I routed the speaker wires back through them (which required going in behind the fender to make the do a 180-degree turn into the body grommet..

After some cutting, had the stuff about right. Sealed up the opening inside with a plastic bag using tar tape, so water can't come through the speaker opening or get on the speaker itself

And, installed. Well, physically installed. I haven't hooked up the wiring yet or done the passenger side, but it'll be the same thing. They're really low on the door so I don't expect a HUGE upgrade in sound, but should be an improvement. I might get some flush-mount tweeters and fit them at the top/front of the door as well, we'll see how it all sounds. 

So mostly I just worked on finishing the deck today. So it's finished:

The only Raider work was my new crank bolt came in. IDK if this particular older bolt was one of the "problem" ones (after all, it's lasted 30 years just fine) but figured might as well replace it with the updated part just for peace of mind

As always, used the "wood bar" trick for holding the crank pulley while torquing to spec. That is, get a piece of wood, put a hole in it, put a bolt in it that fits in one of the edge holes on the crank pulley. Then cut it to a length in which it will touch the floor when the crank hole is perpendicular. As you crank, it basically uses the vehicle's weight to hold the crank in place. Anyhow, worked fine, all torqued to spec (120lb-ft or so)

(and yes, I used a torque wrench)

Engines running on video usually sound horrible but that actually sounds great! Awesome work! 

Scotty Con Queso said:

Engines running on video usually sound horrible but that actually sounds great! Awesome work! 

If I had posted the vid of the first start when. It was misfiring you would have thought otherwise lol. 

So, first things first: the Raider went for its first drive! Well, just a really short one out of the driveway, around the cul-de-sac, and back in. It has dryrotted tires with no tread so not going far :) This was just to make sure everything felt ok. Which it did, other than the ridiculously sloppy steering. Will have to look into that further since everything south of the steering box is brand-new (well, except the underinflated tires, so that might have had an effect too). But now I think back to how sloppy the box steering on my XJ was so...whatever. It drove, so that's exciting. 

The rest of the car work today (after much yard work) was mostly little stuff. Spent about an hour scraping old purple tint off the back windows, which I will re-tint eventually, not in faded purple....

I am still trying to figure out how to get the little bit of tint off that is where the windows overlap on the vertical center seal. I got some of it, but don't have any razor-type tool that can get in there with any pressure. I'm sure tint shops have some special tool to do that kind of thing....I tried to fab up a few improvised things but none of them really worked..

And repaired the tabs on a couple of my switches, using tabs off another switch from another car..

What else.....?

So I've noticed some House Finches have been spending a lot of time in and out of my garage in the last couple days. They're pretty friendly, just hang out until you get too close, fun to watch. I suspected what they were up to, and today I found it...

In my Salomon climatherm boots. No eggs or anything, so I cleaned it out and turned the boot over. I saw them up in that area the other day (sitting on a clothes hanger that's there, kind of funny) and was suspicious. Not that I really care, but my garage doors aren't ALWAYS open and don't want them trapped in or out from their nest. I mean, I live next to woods. My deck out back has like 3 birds nests under it (all Robins). The finches wanted some climate-controlled/predator-free digs, I guess. After I took the stuff out of the boot, and flipped it over, they came back and seemed confused lol...

you can see him there sitting up on the coat hanger next to the boot....

So that's it for now. Near-term stuff....need to order tires. NEED to order a steering wheel. I have one in mind, so will order that up as well.

Amusement: The little Porsche is longer than the Raider (and may be wider too). But half the height.

God I love the Pajero! I keep clicking back on your thread. Best thread on the forum, right now. 

mr2s2000elise said:

God I love the Pajero! I keep clicking back on your thread. Best thread on the forum, right now. 

lol....well, thanks for saying so, happy some people are enjoying it. I'm trying to keep it reasonably interesting even though I'm not doing anything particularly crazy or doing any awesome fabrication like many here do. 

Also, just ordered my tires :)

What tires did you go with ? 

my suv has Ko2 bfg on them now. If they ever wear out, I want to try the wild peaks 

I can't wait to see your pajeros our driving and taking pics in cool places in dc

keep up the great work ! 

mr2s2000elise said:

What tires did you go with ? 

my suv has Ko2 bfg on them now. If they ever wear out, I want to try the wild peaks 

I can't wait to see your pajeros our driving and taking pics in cool places in dc

keep up the great work ! 

Grabber A/TX 31*10.5. they seem to be getting really good reviews and seeing best suited to my purposes, and are about 150 bucks cheaper for the entire set of 5 than the BFGs. 

DC lol. I live about 15 minutes from the city, Its literally been months since I went there. It's a terrible place to drive, with terrible roads and terrible drivers. And that's coming from someone who loves driving  the Cross-Bronx Expressway New York City ;) then again a vehicle like this might actually do well in DC since it's pretty compact and can handle all the terrible roads.

Ok, so got some stuff done today. Well, after I took the rally car out for its weekly few miles at high rpms :)

(mask only pulled up for the photo, I wasn't actually wearing it while driving...)

So that got me thinking that I had some old Hella 3000 Ralleye lights that used to be on that car but took them off a few years ago because the bases were cracked, because they are dumb and plastic for some reason on fairly high-end competition rally lights. whatever

So dug into the metal drawer and happened to find some flat brackets from something or other that looked about right. Did a few measurements, put them in the vise and made a few bends and drilled a few holes, and now I have mount brackets for the lights. The Raider has several threaded holes in the bumper, conveniently, so I put these into the ones that go through to the bumper support "horns"

So got the lights mounted, and ran some wires and a relay, and now I have working floods (still have to make an interior switch)

While up there, I got annoyed at the previous owner who lazily blacked out the "Raider" badge on the grille. These are extruded letters, so decided to do something a bit less boring, with a good deal of precision cutting with an X-acto knife

Then just hit it with the same copper paint as I did on the wheels....subtle, but better than totally black.

While running wiring, Amazon delivered some little stuff I had ordered. So that was good timing as it allowed me to set up a few things. First, a toggle switch for the stereo amp signal wire. I know it can be turned off by the head unit, but I've always liked to have a cutoff switch, don't ask me why. So installed it just down below there. And on the other side I installed a 3-port USB 3.0 charging port. And yeah, I cracked the old brittle plastic in one place and had to do some epoxy work, because i rushed a bit too much. Not all that noticeable, but it'll annoy me. 

Also, something that's annoying about this truck (and also my Porsche) is the lack of cupholders. So I got the same ones I've been using in the Porsche for 2 years now...just some $5 flip-down ones off Amazon. These actually work great and fit literally any size drink from a can to a Big Gulp.

Put them in the spot best to not interfere with driving, arm-resting, or whatever. They're a bit closer to the window cranks than I'd like, but not a big deal....not like i'm rolling the windows up and down constantly.

This is how it would have looked in the 80s, lol...

So the last thing I did was this. The rear defroster doesn't work since half the lines were scratched off when someone removed tint previously. So i scraped off all the remaining copper lines (still leaves an etched orange residue that cannot be removed). And ordered this kit:

So, I wasn't sure if I could put them directly over the old lines without some kind of issue, so I basically split between the old lines. Once I tint the windows, the old lines will pretty much disappear and only the new (darker) ones will be visible. Anyhow, it seems to work fine. Not a big issue, but figured it's worth doing now instead of winter if I decide I want it...

Install was pretty straightforward, though somewhat tedious. Just gotta go REAL slow (not really my strong suit) to make it perfect (I'd say I made it 95% perfect lol)

The wiring hookup location on one side is different from stock, so will have to run a wire. This is just a temp to test things

The factory ground-side wire just barely reached, so just re-used it

Neat project

Not much going on today with the Raider, but I did get around to installing switches for the Hellas as well as three "blanks" for future accessories, etc. All of them are powered with pigtails on the three extras. And just for fun I used old head bolt washers to keep them from pushing through the old plastic, which I think looks kind of cool. 

Freakin Christmas tree with them all on..

Shouldn't the Hellas be mounted a bit more inward? 

mr2s2000elise said:

Shouldn't the Hellas be mounted a bit more inward? 

ok, I'll bite. Why do you say that?

Just to clarify, they don't actually block the headlights. It's just the funky way this phone takes center-shot photos - if that's what you're talking about.  

Here's a more direct-on view. There may be a bit of middle-angle light blocked from the headlights, but we'll see if it's enough to warrant moving them. I do have some holes about 2-3" farther inward that I can use, so that's an option. TBD