The Plymouth Growler

[PR19_Kit]

After fitting the Growler's radiator and trying the fan belt and fan assembly for the Hemi, I've plumped to use the '65 Hemi in the Growler. It'll be tight, but it'll fit, just.

To that end I've sawn up the sacrificial Duster's floor/firewall to get a large enough floor bulge in place to suit the monster Hemi flywheel housing, and done more sawing on the Growler's firewall too. When it comes to the interior bucket I'll have to scratchbuild a new tunnel there as the original Prowler bucket hasn't got one at all, but that should be straightforward, if time consuming.

[PR19_Kit]

Lots of styrene engineering on the Growler this evening. Using the Duster 340's transmission tunnel and grafting it into the Prowler's floor and firewall wasn't the easiest job, but it fits OK. It needed a couple of struts to stop it falling right out while the rest of the glue set, but they'll be invisible once the cabin floor is in place.

I've sawn the Torqueflight transmission off the Hemi (some will say that's sacrilege of course.... ) as the Growler's gearbox is in unit with the rear axle, so the sawn down prop shaft will fit directly into the flywheel housing. I've pinched the 6 Pack manifold and carbs from the Duster's 340 (Fred's suggestion' and it should work nicely) and I'll be looking for some hefty velocity stacks to poke out through the bonnet (hood...) later on.

I've kept on test fitting the Hemi at every stage to ensure it still fits, and so far it does, with the possible exception of its height. Because I'm stuck with the Duster 340s transmission tunnel it's height limits how high up the firewall the Hemi's flywheel housing will go, and the Hemi's deep sump may have to be trimmed a bit to stop it scraping on the ground! That'll have to wait till I can get some wheels fitted though, however temporarily.

Here's how it all looks now, but the Hemi's not glued in place, it's just sitting there.

[Rick Lowe]

Coming along.

Send a pic of the completed build to Jay Leno... 

[PR19_Kit]

Hehehe, his vid on the Prowler is what started me off on this. He had Chip Foose on the show telling how he came to design the project car at Chrysler. 

[Wardukw]

I'll admit that if I did put the engine in this there would be a great chance there wouldn't be any engine covers left 😉
A twin turbo LSX BB Chev takes up quite alot of room and yes I'll happily put a Chev into a Plymouth..hell I'm either going to stuff a monster turboed Nissan RB30 or a TT LSX into a 250 Ferrari..yep i have zero boundaries 😊

[zenrat]

At least you don't have to worry about the sump clearing the K member and steering.

Did you think about putting the flywheel on the gearbox?

...'ll happily put a Chev into a Plymouth..hell I'm either going to stuff a monster turboed Nissan RB30 or a TT LSX into a 250 Ferrari..yep i have zero boundaries 😊

The two 1/25 engine swaps i've done which raised the most eyebrows were a 2 litre Skyline donk into a '32 Ford and a Mazda rotary into a Studebaker.
In one of my boxes of 1/25 engines I have a Tamiya VW flat floor hooked up to a conventional manual transmission (ie front engine rear drive - adapter plates are so easy in scale!) which one day I will put into the front of something like a Model T roadster.

[jcf]

I've already built up the very complex IRS system, complete with its rear mounted transmission. Yes, the prop shaft runs at crankshaft speed!   

Isn't that pretty standard for transaxle equipped cars?

[jcf]

The Prowler would be a good candidate for a gas turbine. Perhaps the ST6 from the
MPC Lotus 56 kit (rereleased in 1995 by AMT Ertl) if you want to go full engine using
the same Revell-Monogram/Revell kit you're doing. The AMT curbside kit would be an
option if you didn't want to use the ST6 from the Lotus 56 kit, of course if you did you
could put the 4-cam Ford V8 Indy engine from the Gurney Eagle kit into the Lotus. It's
an extra in the Eagle kit and was used in the Lotus 56 based Lotus 64.

Turn the Prowler radiator grill opening into an intake and pop the exhaust(s?) out the
side behind the front wheels.

[PR19_Kit]

Isn't that pretty standard for transaxle equipped cars?

It has to be, but such cars are pretty rare. Most transaxle'd cars have rear or mid mounted engines so their 'prop shaft' is almost zero length.

The only one, other than a Prowler, that springs to mind is the 1960s period Pointiac Tempest with the 'half a V8' engine and a piano wire propshaft that ran in a bent square tube thing all the way to the back axle! I worked  on one of them when I was at Pressed Steel.

The Prowler would be a good candidate for a gas turbine. Perhaps the ST6 from the
MPC Lotus 56 kit (rereleased in 1995 by AMT Ertl) if you want to go full engine using
the same Revell-Monogram/Revell kit you're doing. The AMT curbside kit would be an
option if you didn't want to use the ST6 from the Lotus 56 kit, of course if you did you
could put the 4-cam Ford V8 Indy engine from the Gurney Eagle kit into the Lotus. It's
an extra in the Eagle kit and was used in the Lotus 56 based Lotus 64.

Turn the Prowler radiator grill opening into an intake and pop the exhaust(s?) out the
side behind the front wheels.

I've actually got all of those kits in The Loft, so could do that for sure, but a) I've only got one Prowler and b) I just love the total inappropriateness of putting a Hemi in one. 

[jcf]

The Porsche 924/944, 928, Alfa Romeo Alfetta/Alfetta GT/GTV/GTV6, Giulietta 75 and 90 are transaxle cars. Ditto Lancia Flaminia and Aurelia. The 1934 Skoda Popular was the first regular production vehicle to have a transaxle layout.

[zenrat]

...The Prowler would be a good candidate for a gas turbine. Perhaps the ST6 from the
MPC Lotus 56 kit (rereleased in 1995 by AMT Ertl) if you want to go full engine using
the same Revell-Monogram/Revell kit you're doing. The AMT curbside kit would be an
option if you didn't want to use the ST6 from the Lotus 56 kit, of course if you did you
could put the 4-cam Ford V8 Indy engine from the Gurney Eagle kit into the Lotus. It's
an extra in the Eagle kit and was used in the Lotus 56 based Lotus 64...

I've actually got all of those kits in The Loft, so could do that for sure, but a) I've only got one Prowler and b) I just love the total inappropriateness of putting a Hemi in one. 

Got a mid to late sixties Mopar sedan kit up there?  Build a second generation turbine car.  '68 Roadrunner for example...
...or a Turbine General Lee.   

[PR19_Kit]

The Porsche 924/944, 928, Alfa Romeo Alfetta/Alfetta GT/GTV/GTV6, Giulietta 75 and 90 are transaxle cars. Ditto Lancia Flaminia and Aurelia. The 1934 Skoda Popular was
the first regular production vehicle to have a transaxle layout.

I'm not disagreeing, but it's still an unusual layout for a rear drive car.

[PR19_Kit]

Got a mid to late sixties Mopar sedan kit up there?  Build a second generation turbine car.  '68 Roadrunner for example...
...or a Turbine General Lee.   

I do have the rather spiffing Monogram 68-69 Charger kit..................... 

[jcf]

Got a mid to late sixties Mopar sedan kit up there?  Build a second generation turbine car.  '68 Roadrunner for example...
...or a Turbine General Lee. 

Turbine General Sherman 'cuz Lee wasn't someone to honour with anything, he wasn't the man of the romanticized mythology that's been pushed by the "Lost Cause" eejits for the last 150+ years. The actual history of the man, rather than worshipful hagiography, shows who he really was and that he was not the genius on the battlefield that's been promoted for so long. He actually sucked at it and wasted the lives of thousands of his troops, by very poor decisions and no grasp of logistics. The Confederacy and its military started a war that took hundreds of thousands of lives solely in the defense of slavery.

[PR19_Kit]

The Growler has a 'double skinned' floor where the cabin area is, the cabin itself sitting on top of the frame, which has a floor panel too. I'm not sure if the real thing is like that, but that's how Revell have moulded it. Thus the cabin floor has to fit over the much larger flywheel tunnel that I've fitted to make room for the Hemi in that area. 

Trying to figure out what to cut and where was driving me nuts, as I couldn't figure out how to get down into the cabin bath tub with a saw etc. and I don't have my Dremel with me, big mistake. 

Eventually I twigged it, after remembering how I built my brother's Caterham 7 model some years ago, so I just sawed the cabin bath tub in half! Then it was much easier to get to the front half and saw out the bits that I needed to, and then I glued the bathtub back again. Result! 

Here's the two parts with the saw line marked in red. I've got to scratch up the new tunnel somehow and I'll have to try and remember my geometry to work out the development of part of a cone, but I'm sure it'll come to me before much longer.