If you’ve been following the build of Project Raven, the 1983 Imperial that I’ve been wrenching on since the moment I took ownership years ago, you’ll know that my history with engines in that damn car is…well, let’s not beat around the bush, it’s crap. The original fuel-injected 318 that the car left the Windsor factory with self-immolated twice during initial testing. The 318-based 323ci mill that had been a player in the 1981 Dodge Mirada I owned before was an absolute dog in the Imperial…164 wheel horsepower, mid-17s in the quarter, and it was a fresh build that still had pistons coated in a eighth-inch thick layer of burnt oil when I tore it down in 2014. The 400ci big block I wanted to shoehorn into the car turned out to be a pooch and a half and is now simply a bare block sitting in the shop. And the 360 that I’ve been working on since last summer here and there has had it’s own set of issues, from a broken-off water pump bolt to the moment I found main caps that someone hadn’t tightened before the engine had been buttoned up and sold off to Eric Rood. Luckily, the 360’s progress has been a damn sight smoother than the 400’s story. The engine is on it’s way to being assembled, but as you saw in the last installment, one broken piston ring stopped the project dead in it’s tracks. I decided on the spot that I needed to order a ring set…and for some reason or another, I decided that I wanted to measure out a piston just to be sure that I was getting the right size set. The piston itself didn’t give up any clue except the number “992P”, which only led to a generic supply of pistons that could’ve been in any size.

Finally, I got my mitts on a set of calipers and got the measurement that I needed: 4.040″. For those who don’t speak fluent Mopar, the bore of a standard 360 LA block is 4.000″. Combined with a 3.58″ stroke, that equates to a 367 cubic inch small-block Chrysler, and if you go hunting in back issues of Mopar Muscle, back in 2001 Steve Dulcich built up a similar mill for Mopar Muscle, a .040 over 360 yanked from a truck. With California smog requirements needing to be met, for a Chrysler Fifth Avenue meant for his wife, that 360 wound up belting out 335 horsepower and just over 400 ft/lbs of torque with minor bolt-ons. Nothing radical…stock heads, an Edelbrock Performer EGR intake, tube headers, an Edelbrock Thermoquad replacement carb and a Comp Cams XE262 bumpstick. If you don’t think I’m doing the happy dance in my garage right now, you’re sorely mistaken. That made my day.

Have you had a similar kind of scenario play out? Share your story!