Roadkill (2012–2020): Season 4, Episode 5 - Roadkill - full transcript

- This time on Roadkill

the soul of the General Mayhem
gets a new lease on life.

(car engine revving and tires squealing)

I think it's awesome.

- It's pretty good.

(hands clapping)

- That was awesome.

(car tires screeching)

(high energy rock music)

(car tires screeching)

- [David] Before we get into
this episode of Roadkill



cast your mind back to when
we built the General Mayhem,

our 68 Charger that we stuffed

with a 440 out of a motorhome.

Now I'll reveal right now that courtesy

of our sponsorship of Dodge,
yep, the General Mayhem

is now going to get repowered

with a 707 horsepower Hellcat HEMI.

And that leaves me with a spare
440 and 727 sitting around,

cause, yep, we yanked this
thing out of the Charger.

But now we're going to
load it into the bed

of my buddy's truck and head up

around Bakersfield, California,

and give this 440 new
life for the third time.

(high energy rock music)



- We're here north of
Bakersfield, California,

at my friend Steve Dulcich's farm.

You can see over there
he makes grapes happen,

and he turns grapes into raisins.

But he's also a big time Mopar guy,

he's also the editor of
Engine Masters Magazine

and I've known him for a long long time.

We've traded a bunch of
cars around here and there

and we've finally settled on this

one 1970 Plymouth Duster
that's going to be mine.

And we're going to take
the engine transmission

out of the General Mayhem and plop it into

that Duster and drive away
probably in a day or two.

Man the Plymouth Duster is
like my go-to muscle car.

I learned how to drive a stick in one of

these things back in
the 80s and since then

I've owned eight of
em, including this one.

This model is a 1970, the first year

of the Plymouth Valiant Duster.

This one's a six cylinder car.

You know, I've had better
Dusters, I've had worse,

but I haven't had a whole lot
that actually run in drive

and that's what I've got to do here.

The problem is this car
has been sitting here

on the farm for at least five years.

I haven't even seen it in that long

and Finnegan has never seen it.

There it is.

- Is it everything you remember?

- Ah, it's a little worse
than I remembered actually.

- [Steve] Ahh, I don't think so.

- [David] A little more surface rust.

- [Mike] It's got windows though.

That's huge for us.

- This is good.

- [Steve] Oh it's mint.

- [David] It's got rat action
too, look, the rats have

been pulling out the stuffing.

- Well that's the headliner.

Look at the door panels

don't just concentrate on the negatives.

- [David] Oh.
- [Steve] This thing's,

the bench seat's in perfect condition.

- I hope you got a shop vac.

Jesus.

- [David] Look at all the mold.

- [Steve] That's moss.

- [David] There's a difference?

- [Steve] Yeah.

- [David] (laughs) That's gross.

- [Steve] It's moss.

(David laughs)
It's natural, come on man.

- [Mike] If we didn't arrive here soon

this car was going to return to the earth.

- [Steve] I think this
thing's pretty good actually.

It's straight, it's as straight as a dice.

I mean this thing runs like a top.

Well it did, if it had a motor, maybe.

- Oh, did you dent this?

- [Steve] I dunno.

- [David] I think you did.

- [Steve] I don't remember that.

- Can you fix that for
me while we're here?

- [Steve] Yeah.
- [David] Cause that's

not good.
- [Steve] Yeah, I dunno.

- [Mike] There's no latch on one of these.

- [Steve] Do you remember
how to open the hood

on that Freiburger?
- [David] Oh yeah.

Do you know how many Dusters I've had?

(car hood clanging)
There ya go.

- [Steve] You know how to open the hood.

- [David] That's the key.

- [Steve] I was wondering if
you'd have the technique down.

- [David] Hey it has a transmission.

- Power steering.
- [David] Yep.

- [Steve] Manual brakes,
it's set up perfectly.

This is every bit as good as I recall.

I think it's too good for you Freiburger.

- You think it is?
- [Steve] Look at that grill.

- [David] The grill is nice.

- [Steve] I should have swiped
that before your saw it.

- Did you buy this thing
initially or did I?

- No, I bought that.

And I traded you a Dart over
there for a set of heads.

- Oh that's right.

- And I was going to trade
you this for that Charger

but I bought the Charger cause
you had it on Craigslist.

- [David] Right.
- [Steve] So I ended up

with both of your cars.

- After all that I gave
you a 71 Challenger.

Or is it a 70?

Well I don't know you took care of the-

- [Steve] I did take care of it.

- [David] I mean, yeah, we're even.

- [Steve] We're even, yeah.

- [Mike] I am so confused, which car

are we even working on now?

- [David] This one.

- I don't have a clue
what's going on right now.

I guess the end result
is we're going to drag

this out with a tractor right now.

And we're going to get it running

using the running gear
out of the General Mayhem,

which, as you remember is,
all used motorhome parts.

Hey look at that, it rolls!

- Today's Tuesday, we've got the rest

of the week to work on it.

Basically I just want to get
this car running and driving.

If I can actually get it to the point

where it moves up and down the street

under its own power we
might go to the drag strip

but basically I just need to do burnouts.

I did a little bit of a
poll on our Facebook page

asking people whether we should do

a Pro Stock lookalike
drag car out of the Duster

or make it more of a daily driver.

And surprisingly enough people
wanted to see a daily driver.

So the Crop Duster, named
for Dulcich's farm here,

is going to end up, hopefully,

as a daily drivable, big block A-body.

(drill whirring)

(uptempo electronic music)

- This is a rare moment in Roadkill,

we are inside of a shop
with most of the tools

we need to do the job.

Still, we'll manage to
take forever to do this.

Here's another Duster on the property

and this thing has a really good story.

This is actually a
pretty famous project car

in Car Craft Magazine.

It was just called the Orange Duster,

people just knew it as that,
they still ask about it.

Well, like 13 years ago
I sold it to Dulcich

because I needed to get an
engagement ring for my now wife.

I know what you're thinking,
"Yep, well, but he's let

"the thing just sit here
and pretty much rot."

It had a 360 in it and a four speed

and what did this thing run,
like 12-70s at Bakersfield?

It was pretty good.

But now that it's been
sitting here forever

I'm going to shamelessly part it out.

I'm going to pull the
eight and three-quarter

out of this thing so that we can throw it

into the new Duster.

Because as you can see the new Duster

is far more critical
to finish than this one

with a fresh, shiny,
Steve Dulcich paint job.

- Why don't we just put the
motor in this one then too?

- [David] (chuckles) Because
that would make too much sense.

- Oh, oh yeah, yeah.

(funky upbeat music)

- That is all junk.

Flimsy leaf springs, tiny 10 inch brakes,

seven and a quarter inch with, who knows,

probably a 323 or worse.

Garbage.

The motor here is a Mopar big block.

A 440 out of a 77 motorhome.

Now the trick here is that a big block

was never available in a
Duster from the factory

so installing it is going
to be a bit of a trick.

And we need more power,
this thing was rated

at 185 fly wheel horsepower.

And we're going to fix that throwing on

a bunch of speed parts
out of Dulcich's stock

including a used set of Edelbrock C and C

ported cylinder heads.

We're going to throw a
cam shaft in the thing.

We've got an Edelbrock air gap intake

and a Holley 750 carburetor.

We've only worked half a day today

and we're virtually done.

We're going to slam these heads on

then we got to pull the
whole front dress off,

slap a cam shaft in it, put it together,

and we're going to have it
in the car this evening.

In time for steak.

At RB's.

At the gas station, at midnight.

In the end we did the math and found out

that this thing is only going
to have 8.0 to one compression,

which is officially not good.

We also changed out the camshaft.

We originally thought we we're
going to install a Huize grind

but when Dulcich spotted
his old Isky supercam

that was in his Charger
in his high school years

more than 25 years ago he knew that was

the bumpstick we had
to have for good luck.

- It's only 6.30 at night,
and I think we're going to

leave soon cause we've
made so much progress.

We've added aluminum heads
to the General Mayhem motor

which is now going in the Crop Duster.

And because we didn't
clean off the dirt fish mud

the whole engine looks aluminum.

Dirty aluminum but aluminum nonetheless.

We'll be done by tomorrow night.

(bright upbeat electric guitar)

- Our goal here is to do everything

as cheaply as possible by using everything

we can off of the Charger.

And that includes this 26 inch
radiator that's way bigger

than the 22 that was
available in the Duster.

We measured it up and the
radiator was going to hit

the hood so it was time
to break out the big guns.

- Oh that moved a lot.

(sledgehammer and wood clanking)

Owww.
- [Mike] Sorry.

- [Steve] That's some blow.

(sledgehammer and wood clanking)

- [David] Okay.

(sledgehammer and wood clanking)

- [David] Oooh, that was a close one.

- Oh yeah.
- [Steve] That was a good one

Man you're getting good.

- [David] You should see it.

- [Steve] One more, one more.
- [Mike] One more?

Alright.
- [David] Famous last words.

- [Steve] How does it look Freiburger?

- It looks carefully massaged.

Oh yeah.

- Yeah, that's practically French 10.

- [David] It is.

These are TTI headers,
which is like the best.

Watch this glaring endorsement.

These are actually one
and three quarter inch

engine swap headers just for putting

the big block in the A-body.

This header actually
fits a B and E-body also.

But the miracle is that
it fits the A-body.

So it turns out the
headers don't fit after all

which I would have known if I'd read

either the website or the
instructions for these things.

The problem is that the
high deck big block 440

does not work when you
try and use power steering

which was a luxury I was not willing

to give up for this particular Duster.

So let the mayhem begin.

This is going to get ugly.

(metal clanging)

- Plenty of flow for a motorhome now.

Don't come over here.

(metal clanging)

- [Steve] I feel like
the village blacksmith.

- Beautiful.

- [David] What happened to this header?

Dude, you've got to be kidding me.

I paid $700 for these.

- [Mike] Dulcich'll give
you 20 bucks for em now.

- [David] This was about the
time I need to break the news

to Finnegan and Dulcich that no matter

how many times you bash
the header with a hammer

it doesn't help when you don't
hit it in the right place.

So Dulcich is going to
have to fix it with fire.

(funky upbeat music)

(blowtorch whistling)

(metal clattering)

(grinder whirring)

(blowtorch whistling)

(funky upbeat music)

- [Steve] Oh I fully intend to destroy

your header Freiburger.

- I think we're past that point.

- [Steve] Yeah you're probably right.

- Yeah.

- Cause if you ordered the right header

I wouldn't have to save you.

The earmuffs on fire has
to be perfectly done.

You owe me a new pair of earmuffs.

- [David] Wow it's like a
alcohol fire, it's burning.

- [Steve] Yeah once earmuffs go up.

- [David] Yeah, you
just, you can't stop em.

- [Steve] It's like a
nuclear power plant disaster.

- [David] Yeah.

I'll go ahead and just
keep that from burning

the water hose cause then it
might pop and put the fire out.

- [Mike] Yeah that would be a shame.

- [Steve] Is there any
part you're unhappy with?

- Oh the whole thing.

- [Steve] Really?
- [David] Yeah.

- [Steve] I can split that right there

and then re-weld it and take
that little dimple out of it.

- It's that dimple that's going to kill

the 12 horsepower that we need.

- Yeah?

(drill whirring)

(blowtorch whistling)

Oh!

(laughs) I think I'm done.

- It's neat.

- How's that Freiburger?

- Yeah.

It's mint.

It turns out that reading the directions

is in fact more convenient
than pulling the engine

in and out like five times!

Cause if I'd read em I
would have discovered

that the Schumacher Creative
Services engine mount kit

says clearly you've got to use

a mopar C body oil pan with their kit.

Amazingly Dulcich had one in stock.

And then we had to pull
out the engine again

because the instructions also say

that you need to cut out a portion

of the cross member to
clear the external oil pump

on the big block.

But once we'd got all that done

the accessories finally
began to fall into place.

We got the radiator on
it, the intake manifold,

the carburetor, we we're
starting to feel good.

- [David] Now it's the morning

of engine should have
been running already day

but we've still got some stuff to do.

We installed all our MSD ignition,

including a six AL box under the battery,

new distributor, coil, and wires.

We also have a new adOptima battery.

Yeah that's an Optima that we've
adopted from another owner.

What happens is guys send these batteries

back for warranty to Optima.

Optima checks em, there's
nothing wrong with em,

and so they send em to Roadkill.

- We are about to start
working on the exhaust system.

We've got the old pipes
from the General Mayhem here

that don't exactly line up.

And then one of our
headers is pointing right

into the cross member
for the transmission.

So we're cutting the collector apart,

we're going to weld this
whoop de doo right into it.

Cut that again and we'll make
it work, one way or another.

(welder buzzing)

- Well it's not hitting.

- [David] Awesome.

- Now we've got to re-cut it

and weld another bend to it,

practically making it
an S so that we can try

to connect the rest of the exhaust pipes,

which we've scavenged
from the General Mayhem.

(grinder whirring)

(welder buzzing)

- The priority on Roadkill is never

to actually get the engine running.

It's to do things like exhaust,

cosmetics, making the
spark plug wires perfect.

Whether the engine actually
runs is really insignificant.

- [Steve] It's all about
the noise and style.

- [David] It's all about the accessories.

(welder buzzing)

Well the exhaust system took all day long

but the upside is we're finally ready

to bring the 440 to life.

We're about to fire it up
for the very first time

and the thing is you really want to get it

to just snap, fire right
up, cause we have to break

in a hydraulic flat tap, a camshaft.

You have to mate the surface of the lifter

to the lobe on the camshaft by running

the thing up at varying high
RPM for about 20 minutes.

These things are notorious for going flat,

meaning that wear surface
just eats itself alive.

This is a cross your
fingers moment right here.

We'll probably screw it up.

(engine revving)

And we fired up the 440
and it was all smiles

from three completely worn out dudes.

And we should probably be
concerned that the header

was glowing red while we
were breaking in the camshaft

but that's not really important right now.

What's important is win.

- It's Friday morning,
this thing is supposed

to be running and driving by now.

And it's not so that's
when we start parting out

the nice car here.

Now you might ask yourself
why would we be building

the clapped out old white Duster

instead of the perfectly
good nice orange Duster?

See the problem is as soon
as you paint something

and have expectations of it being nice

the whole project just pretty much

falls apart at that point.

This has been sitting
here for almost 10 years

because Dulcich wants to do it right.

He doesn't want to slam
it together in a week

like the white one and so naturally,

since he has no plans
to actually work on it

and make it perfect, we're
going to part it out.

We're going to take the
rear end out of this thing

and I've a feeling the gas tank's going to

be coming out it pretty soon too.

(bright acoustic guitar)

- [Mike] We could have stolen
the exhaust off this car.

We're idiots.

- [David] The rear axle that we took out

of the white Duster is a
mopar seven and a quarter,

which is fragile like glass.

This new rear end is a mopar
eight and three quarter

which is the diameter of the ring gear.

And these things are pretty
beefy and this particular one

has 4-10 gears, a sure
grip, and caltracs bars

for traction devices on the leaf springs.

Last night will no one
was paying attention

Dulcich and I put the disc brakes on it

because even Roadkill is
not irresponsible enough

to put a big block into an A-body

with the stock 10 inch front drum brakes,

which are really bad.

We used a kit from CPP.

It's basically later model mopar stuff

like calipers off mid-70s cars.

And it uses a B-body spindle,

the thing is that the upper
ball joint is different

for those and so they also give you

a new stamped upper control
arm that drops right

into the A-body but uses
the B-body type ball joint

to adapt the whole thing.

Almost the last thing
I think we have to do

is the drive shaft.

I've got the shaft that came out

of the General Mayhem 68 Charger.

And it's a longer wheel base than this car

so it needs to be shorter
even though the spline

on the transmission and the
yoke at the back are identical.

So we're just going to measure it up,

chop this drive shaft
in half, shorten it up,

weld it back together.

And it'll be balanced perfectly.

(upbeat music)

Here's something you really
do not want to do at home.

And you really don't want
to have Finnegan and Dulcich

do it for you either cause watch this,

they're going to cut up this drive shaft,

shorten it, grind it,
weld it back together,

and do a lot of praying
that it is going to survive.

(upbeat electronic music)

- I'm genuinely excited
to see when we put this

back together, a, does
it shake the car apart,

and, b, does it end up going right through

the floorboards of the car
during the first whole shot.

With David driving.

- [David] Imagine this,
the drive shaft also

took all day to do.

We're a whole day behind
now so we wrapped it up

by throwing the hood back on the car,

test riding some wheels and tires.

We did our own home wheel alignment

and finally it was time for some sleep.

(bright acoustic guitar)

(sander grinding)

- Today's weird.

It's like opposite day.

Instead of laying on the ground

wiring, plumbing,
welding, I'm standing here

watching Dulcich prep a trunk to paint it.

- [David] I don't know what is wrong

with Dulcich's little brain when he looks

at this Duster and goes,

"I can't live with myself
because it has a brown deck lid."

So we watched him paint the thing

before we finally pushed the
car outside ready for burnouts!

But no, even on Roadkill,

it's the laziness that will bite you.

I'd had a brand new year one gas tank

ready to install in this thing for a week

and I didn't do and when we finally got

the car outside the carburetor clogged

up with a bunch of varnish.

So there we were lying on our backs

in the middle of the street
with gas running down

our armpits and we threw
in that new gas tank

and finally the moment
you've all been waiting for.

(engine revving)

(engine revving and tires squealing)

Normally burnouts are good enough way

to end an episode of Roadkill
but there's more wind

to be had this time.

We're going to roll this thing down

to the chassis dyno at
West Tech Performance.

(engine revving)

Survey says 356 rear wheel horsepower

and 419 pound feet of torque at the tire.

But even better than
that next we're going to

take it to the drag strip.

- See this, that's a torque flight

automatic transmission extension housing.

It's not supposed to be quick release.

- We got the special two piece deal right?

- After the dyno day we discovered

that our hideously unbalanced
drive shaft broke this.

So it went back up to Steve's place

for a whole bunch of fixes.

He's solved this, fixed the drive shaft,

and finally transformed the Duster

into the 80s street race look,

the icon that I was lookinng
for with the six pack scoop.

We got Cragars on it now, we
got MNHs we're going to hook up.

And finally we're at the drag strip

to see what it's going to run.

What's your guess?

- [Steve] I'm hoping it's
going to be under 12 somewhere.

- [David] Say it out loud.

- And I also hope it
makes it down the track

in one piece.
- [David] That's all I'm

hoping for.
- [Steve] In a straight line,

I aligned this with a tape
measure and bubble level so--

- [David] What could go wrong?
- [Steve] It may be a little

shaky at the top.

- I should make you ride.

- I would.

(engine rumbling)

(tires squealing)

(engine rumbling)

(engine roaring)

- Whoa, dude!

- Yeah that's pretty fast.

- [David] I got to tell ya this episode

was a lot of really grueling wrenching.

I pretty much killed Dulcich and Finnegan,

not to mention the video crew,

but I don't care cause I got
a time slip that says 12.39.

At 113 miles an hour that is not bad

for what we pulled off here.

Especially when you consider
that the short block

is stock motorhome garbage.

And forgive me a little
bit of bench racing

but I will tell you this thing could use

a little bit more work on the carburetor,

it needs a better torque invertor,

and it will go in the 11s.

I've had a whole lot of Dusters

but I think this is finally the one.

This car looks exactly
like every street race car

that I ran against in the 80s.

Finnegan says that this car
is going to go right back

to Dulcich's farm and rot for
another five to seven years.

And I admit that would be my norm

but I'm going to do everything
I can to prove him wrong.

I really want to drive this car

and maybe you'll find out
it I can live up to that

on a future episode of Roadkill.

- [Voiceover] We need you to pat the cat,

holding it like Dr Evil.

- [Voiceover] He's patting the cat.

(uptempo guitar music)