So Plan A crapped out when I ran afoul of a greedy sod who thought his turd-brown, rusty, blowed-up-engine VW van was worth $3500. And here I thought he might take $150 since it'd take a grand or more to get it driveable as is....
Plan B would be much the same as A, at least in concept if not execution. How hard is it to find a Concorde-type car with a standard trans? Take the whole drivetrain as is from the derelict Dodge/Plymouth donor and transplant it directly into the bed area of the Arrow. Gas would move from current location to behind the axle; radiator and battery would be along side the engine with air ducting for the radiator.
Major points to remember are: this won't be used as a pickup beyond a few bags of groceries; it will be a DD with civil manners; and winter driving will be expected of it.
So then...Am I still crazy?
And I do know about the 2.7 v6's sad history, so I'll need some guidance/enabling in respect to the engine.
did they ever make one with a manual?
Okay. I couldn't find reference to one on Allpar, so I figured as much.
That leaves me with swapping the entire drivetrain from a LH or LHS, unless I'm mistaken. At least THIS version doesn't require an engine swap as well as the tranny/suspension. And it's already a engine first, tranny second, in-line drivetrain. This does simplify the whole mid-engine concept.
Now then...off to work finding the donor LH/LHS. Suggestions?
Look for a 3.5 HO from a '98-up 300M or Intrepid R/T. They are rated at about 250 or so horses, depending on what model and year. The '98-up 3.5's were all aluminum. These 2nd gen LH cars also had some upgrades to the transaxle too. For a little more gear, you can grab the transfer gears out of a 2.7 transaxle. That's what they did for the 300M Special.
It will be easier to drop the whole package out from under the donor car than to try and pull it out of the top.
