Project: Medusa

[Will]

Medusa - "Gazing directly upon her would turn onlookers to stone." - Wikipedia

She was a hand-me-down from an uncle of mine.  He picked her up hoping to do a quick restoration, but due to time and money restrictions left her sitting under some power lines in rural Virginia.  She sat there for about 5 years unnoticed and untouched.  Looking to just get rid of the car he asked me if I wanted her.  I live and work in New York City and had had little need of a car, but what I did need was a project.  This is all rather fortuitous considering my father used to be a service manager at an AMC dealer in Richmond, Virginia. 

After changing the oil, fueling her up, replacing the battery, and tinkering with the carb I was pleasantly surprised to see how quickly she woke up.  It wasn't too long after that she started showing the signs of her neglect.  The transmission started slipping, the exhaust manifold was leaking, and then the head gasket went.  This is going to be a project indeed. 

I present Medusa. 

[Prafeston]

Cool! Look forward to watching this. Eggs for taking this on!

[vangremlin]

Looks like a fun project!  Good luck with it!

[shanebo]

Hows the under body on her will? From what I can see it looks to be a solid car. Eggs for giving it a new lease on life! I look foward to seeing your progress.

[Will]

When I was down in Virginia over the holidays my father and I broke the engine down.  The rod and main bearing are pristine and the cylinder walls, minus a little carbon at the quench, were in great shape.  This is a good thing considering I wanted to avoid boring her.  The jury is still out on that though. Ultimately I will have to wait and see what the machinist has to say.   I should find out this weekend.  Fingers crossed. 

As for the head-that is getting sent out this weekend to this place ----> http://larryspower.com/

They are doing the following:

• Three angle valve job
• decking the head 0.030 inch
• porting

I will post pictures of the breakdown when I get home from work.

Best,

Will

[Eagleearl]

Sounds like a good project. This would be a good time to put a 4.0 head and cam on it. Have fun with it.

[Baskinator]

I second the 4.0 head suggestion, unless you plan on keeping it bone stock (which I would do if it is all original). The junkyard parts for the conversion could probably be had for nearly the same price of machining the head.

Looks pretty sweet, the SX/4 is my favorite (I'm a little biased since I own one also) and I like the b&w pictures. Sure hope you still have all that trim that is missing from the picture What kind of package did she come with?

[Will]

To answer your questions -

Yes I have all the trim.  In the photos thus far you can see that it is removed.  This was done to inspect for rust spots.  Thus far there are none that are visible! 

To my dismay she is an automatic.  And an expensive one at that.  That was the first thing I had to have rebuilt.  When I had my transmission guy take her down he told me that whoever had done it in the past had really screwed things up.

Regarding the head - I would like to keep her as stock as possible.  Minus a larger cam and a new carburetor.  I'm not looking to take her rock climbing or racing.  I just want a nice little "peppy," yet reliable weekend car.  From what my father tells me, "You can't kill these cars!"  When we took the engine apart I was amazed at how there was little to no wear on the rod and main bearings. 


Here are some pics of my father and I taking the block apart.






As the project starts developing a little more of a colorful momentum I will start including more color imagery. 

[68AMXGOPAC]

The black and white is cool format ,  I like it. As for NYC , argggh, I took a ride there a couple weeks ago to pick up a friends dog due to a flight cancel.He said when you go   over the bridge get off on Boat basin ramp.I had come down the Taconic to Sawkill etc etc , and when I paid some $4 toll I saw a big bridge off to the right and headed for it in 5 p.m. traffic - LOL< much to my dismay it took me to NJ !! and cost me $12 to get back across !!
I have some interior stuff and odd parts from an SX/4 parts rig I got awhile ago.

[Baskinator]

The carter carb isn't too difficult to rebuild if you do it yourself. But I feel that if you change to the Motorcraft carb, you might as well do the head swap with as much engine work as you have into it already. The only thing that looks noticeably different is the valve cover, and you don't have to switch to fuel injection if you don't want to. Just my opinion, I feel that if one thing is changed, the rest doesn't matter.

[Will]

I got most of my interior squared away first thing.  When my uncle let her sit under those power lines and colony of mice made it there home.  Poop aside, they ate that carpet up.  What I would like to do is find someone to rebuild a stock AM/FM radio with an iPod port. Anyone got any suggestions?

As for the head.  I'm nostalgic.  I would like to pull as much out of that 4.2 head as possible.  Anyone ever put roller rockers on there head?  Just started my homework on it.  

[Prafeston]

I haven't looked into the how, but I was contemplating gutting the original radio and installing a newer headunit behind the original face plate. So appearance wise it would look stock, but I could have my CD/iPod hook ups behind it all. Ideally, the original radio face would fold up and down to reveal the new unit behind it.

[Baskinator]

Maybe you can find someone on here with an AM/FM/Cassette radio, and just use a cassette adapter to the iPod. Otherwise, I believe they do make iPod ports you can wire into the back. They run upwards of $40 and actually play through a designated radio station. However, you could get an FM tuner for your iPod that's cheaper and plays surprisingly clear through the stock radio. My iTrip works very well, and I was contemplating this before too.

I've never done it with roller rockers, but I have yet to do any major engine work on the Eagle. I doubt it would give any kind of noticeable difference in power, and it could create more stress problems in the long run. Although, it might be safe or necessary if you do upgrade to a more aggressive cam. You just might have to worry about things like valve float and bending pushrods. I think stronger springs would be a sufficient upgrade with the new cam.

The only thing I can think of that will add more power to the stock engine is to build a stroker. There are a bunch of members on here that can help you with that. Nothing else will give significant increase in hp without changing the look or getting rid of stock components. Ways to increase hp would be: ignition upgrade, 4.0 head swap, fuel injection, high flow exhaust, stroke the engine, manual trans conversion, change the differential gears- Not all of the ways, just the most common.

[priya]

I've never done it with roller rockers, but I have yet to do any major engine work on the Eagle. I doubt it would give any kind of noticeable difference in power, and it could create more stress problems in the long run.

I can't see that.  How do you figure that would be the case?

[Baskinator]

I'm just saying that yes, it would decrease the amount of friction, but it would add unnecessary complexity to the engine and leave more room for failure in the future. The bearings can wear down, especially if you skimp on the rocker quality to save money.