It's the same as GM's. The second one you listed is common on some Fords. They can't even be consistent with their engines. Firing order is 18436572. Here's a few other details to watch for. There were four small block engines. The 273 went away around 1967. The 318 was the same thing just bored out a little. The 340 was also the same thing but was only around from 1968 through 1973. All of them can use the same crank and connecting rods. They have three different bore sizes. The 360 started around 1971 or '72. The crankshaft journals are larger on the 360. If you find an older 340 from 1968 through 1971, they had 10.5 / 1 compression and larger valves. Those heads were going for over $500.00 a pair more than ten years ago. The '72 and '73 heads had smaller valves for emissions purposes but the runners were the same. That means you could grind the valve seats to a larger diameter and install the bigger valves. The 360s use those same heads and you could find those engines all over the place. Even though you can make them into the higher flowing more popular heads, most Chrysler owners, unlike me, are fanatics about having the right casting numbers on the parts so they can prove they are original. Depends on whether you want to go fast or show off to people that you can go fast, I guess. Next, look at the vibration damper to see if there is an offset extra weight cast into it and look at the torque converter to see if a small weight is welded to it. All 273 and 318 crankshafts were forged. The '73 340 only, and all of the 360s had cast crankshafts. It was hard to cast some of the counterweights so they added them to the damper and torque converter. I don't know if they were still doing that in '88. If that becomes a concern, the auto parts stores have entire catalogs for replacement vibration dampers and they will list the right one for the application. You'll feel the drive line vibration if you have the wrong parts. If you take the block to a machine shop for cleaning, be sure to ask if they removed any plugs that must be replaced. We had a local shop remove one from the oil circuit and didn't tell the owner. To check it, stick a piece of wire, such as a coat hanger, down the hole where the oil pressure sending unit screws in at the back top of the block. There should be a plug 7 1/4" down. If it's missing, oil will bypass the filter. The last thing to be aware of, same as your GM engines, is spark plug wire routing. Cylinders 5 and 7 are right next to each other in the firing order and most people pluck the wires next to each other in the wire holder on the valve cover to keep them in order. Instead, put the number 5 wire in the front and the number 7 wire in the back so they'll be a few inches apart. We had a local body shop owner who was an Olympic caliber downhill skier / national rodeo champion / turned late model stock car champion who was a few days from going to NASCAR before he was killed in a crash as he was going for the lead in a feature race. Shortly before that he blew up two $25,000.00 Chrysler engines in two weeks at the track three miles from my house. Later they figured out it was from having those two spark plug wires right next to each other. On normal engines that usually isn't much of a problem but with their high voltage ignition systems the current through one plug wire sets up such a strong magnetic field that it could induce a voltage into the plug wire next to it. That meant one plug would fire too soon as the piston was just starting to come up on the compression stroke. They didn't have any more trouble once they moved that one wire. He said he could feel and hear the misfiring too long before the engines blew up so they had a clue to the problem. (He raced Camaros and Dodge Challengers up through 1981 when he was killed). Those were two Dodge 355s hew blew up. They were stroked 340s. Well, there's your history lesson for today. If you had good luck with your GM engines, just follow the same procedures for this one.
Wednesday, March 16th, 2011 AT 8:23 PM
