Hey, nice forum.

I'm considering a Cummins swap in my '82 D-350 crew cab. I'm planning on swapping the front doors, fenders, quad headlight grille and headlight buckets, and radiator core support over to the '79-'80 look, painting it red, adding wood on the sides of the utiline bed, and adding big chrome exhaust stacks in the step areas, naming the truck, "Big Red Express", and having decals and pinstripes made up that look like those on the truck this is inspired by...

This is going to be the tow vehicle for when I want to take my '78 Cordoba out of town on any long drive. I'm also considering a regular Magnum 5.9L V8 swap, but the fuel economy and power both would be better with the Cummins. I figure you guys would probably be able to point me in the right direction as far as what I need to get in order to do the swap. I've considered buying a bodily-beat but strong running Cummins D-series Ram for a donor truck, but most of the trucks I've found are either really high miles or they want a lot for them, or both.

Plus, I can't deny that a 24V engine or a newer 6.7L I6 are appealing choices too, which would clearly require going in a different direction.

 

Welcome to the DTR, Tannon!

Be sure to check out the Cummins Conversion forum for some pointers...

You are going to get zero votes for the V-8 on this website.

A 12V would be the easiest...

A 6.7L would be the coolest.

 

Something like this?

 

Welcome to the website.

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John_P

 

Basically. I'm going 2wd for fuel economy as it'll be an over-the-road vehicle, and I'm certainly going for a different color *grin*

 

This is the truck before,

and after it was done,

What you don't like the OMG green? It is my first paint job, wanted to do a light color. Could not find a darker one that I felt that I could do. So Sublime lime was a simple choice for a Mopar head.
MM

 

Nothing wrong with it, but I'm building "Big Red Express"...