Anyone know anything about these things??? I have the opportunity to get one probably for free and just wanted a few things cleared up. I was going to get it running good and do a spring over lift and run some 33 or 35 inch tires. The one thing im kinda stumped over is that it comes with pretty weak axles(Dana 25/Dana27). Would it be easier to just throw a Dana 30 and 8.8 in it for sake of strengthen and part availability??? Also I know the engine is only rated at 60hp but is there any easy engine swap options with out getting a new tranny and t-case??? And if not will the stock engine be fine if I bored it out and cammed it and did some other smaller thing to it??? Thanks in advance.
My neighbor has one of those. Trust me, it's fun as hell just as it sits.
The reason it has weak axles is because it has a weak drive train and it's not exactly a heavy vehicle. 60hp? HAH, not likely. They often slicked one up just a bit and ran it without accessories or anything to suck down power in order to beat the other guy's numbers. My bet is around 40-45 new and probably closer to 30hp now. Should have a flathead in it if it's the original engine. Which is still plenty to move it around.
If you do anything to the flathead just put a nice rebuild on it. They'll never flow enough air to be a performance engine. You can get them better, but say if you spent the money to have a 900HP v8, you'd have
maybe a 180/200HP flathead, and we're talking fancy forced induction and fuel delivery too. They flow enough air to putter around pretty good, but that's really about it. It's simply not cost effective.
If it's an actual MB, and it's still all there and runable. I'm going to have to go with leave it. They're all correct that it's value is only going up. They made these things SUPER simple, and most parts should actually be quite easy to come by still, mainly because they used the same parts for so many years. Though some might still have to be ordered (truthfully the same goes for modern cars).
But at the same time I hate telling people how to build THEIR projects.
I tell you what, poke at it and at least get it moving and reasonably driveable. Cruise around in it for a few months, maybe a year. If you still want to mod it, go for it. Just be sure to get in contact with collectors in the mean time so the discarded parts don't go to waste.
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