For Sale 1972 police fury l 440ci

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I am out of touch. Is $7,500 a reasonable price for that car?

When it comes to cars that are old and relatively rare, it is worth whatever somebody is willing to pay for it. These police cruisers have an estimated survival rate of less than 5% due the the fact that most were parted out for the engine and transmission.

Dave
 
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ref. the question of values of ex-squads.....I compare this car to mine.....mine is a 1970 Fury III, motor was rebuilt, needs nothing for bodywork, interior and has all emergency equipment......someone made me an offer earlier this year for 18k and I politely refused.....you probably would have between 20-25k invested when done to match my car. Now arguably is a '70 more valuable and has interest/price gone up and by how much. Be informed, do your homework and be ready to purchased based on the work you have done. The more homework you do will validate the purchase especially when cost of restoration surprises come up. In other words you will still love the car and be happy with the purchase. All of my cars I try to maximize the spread between amount invested vs value of car.
 
With 3.23 gears in a 69-70 pursuit special U code car, you could expect to get about 135mph out of it without breaking it.
By 1972, they were significantly de-tuned with the holly carb and a much leaner mixture so about 125mph was about it on flat land running. A lot of cruisers came in for valve jobs after any long term pursuits from '72 on. The 74 and later ones would often burn out the valve cover sealant and either catch fire or run out of oil on extended high speed pursuits.

Dave

this is interesting. never heard about that problem before.

not challenging/debating your experience/info ... just surprised my fleet sources (retired shop guys from a couple states) didnt hip me to that propensity.

thx.
 
I am out of touch on car prices. Is $7,500 a reasonable price for that car?

this asking price ... on the surface .. doesnt offend my sensibilities. i'd wanna see it in person before paying anything that started with "7".

with a few questions of seller, id pay up to $5k for it without seeing it in person.

thats just me...opinions of course may vary.
 
With 3.23 gears in a 69-70 pursuit special U code car, you could expect to get about 135mph out of it without breaking it.
By 1972, they were significantly de-tuned with the holly carb and a much leaner mixture so about 125mph was about it on flat land running. A lot of cruisers came in for valve jobs after any long term pursuits from '72 on. The 74 and later ones would often burn out the valve cover sealant and either catch fire or run out of oil on extended high speed pursuits.

Dave

It was the 80's and mine had some tweaks to bring it as close as I could to the 69 spec 440 Super Commando/ Magnum/ TNT , which I believe was the ultimate stock 440 combo (multi carbs I've always found to be a bugger to get tuned right.) and it did not have a Holley (because I loath Holleys...so Chevy). It was still pulling like a SOB at 120 mph.
 
this is interesting. never heard about that problem before.

not challenging/debating your experience/info ... just surprised my fleet sources (retired shop guys from a couple states) didnt hip me to that propensity.

thx.

What was happening regarding the oil leaks from the post 73 heads was that the center line exhaust ports got very hot with full throttle use. So hot that the gasket material burned out and a large oil leak resulted. There was a service advisory to that effect not to use cork gaskets on those cars. The factory composite gaskets were not much better as a replacement as they could not take that much heat either. We had some luck with a liquid gasket material used in aircraft engines which solved the leakage problem. Was some really nasty stuff to clean off if the engine had to come back apart. Keep in mind that this was a problem mostly on severe service police vehicles and was probably not much of an issue on everything else.

Dave
 
What was happening regarding the oil leaks from the post 73 heads was that the center line exhaust ports got very hot with full throttle use. So hot that the gasket material burned out and a large oil leak resulted. There was a service advisory to that effect not to use cork gaskets on those cars. The factory composite gaskets were not much better as a replacement as they could not take that much heat either. We had some luck with a liquid gasket material used in aircraft engines which solved the leakage problem. Was some really nasty stuff to clean off if the engine had to come back apart. Keep in mind that this was a problem mostly on severe service police vehicles and was probably not much of an issue on everything else.

Dave

thx.

while awaiting your or anyones response i looked thru some of my 440 build receipts. my builder used Fel-pro VC rubber gaskets on everything civi and police '68 to '78. i dont recall ever discussing "why" over the course of 10 rebuilds .. i assume he knew what u know.

in a few days ill see what my retired shop guys (michigan and ny state) know as well as what my mechanic uses for leaky covers in general.

my cop cruisers will never see "full throttle all day long" under my ownership so im not gonna sweat it too much.

again thx!
 
never heard about that problem before
The quality/reliability of domestic cars from the 1970s is well-documented from various sources. My bible is the pair of volumes from authors Sanow & Bellah published in 1994 & '96: "Dodge, Plymouth & Chrysler Police Cars (1956-1994)". My belief is that a well-maintained police car (from any era) will exceed the durability of most cars being chased during an average pursuit.
 
The quality/reliability of domestic cars from the 1970s is well-documented from various sources. My bible is the pair of volumes from authors Sanow & Bellah published in 1994 & '96: "Dodge, Plymouth & Chrysler Police Cars (1956-1994)". My belief is that a well-maintained police car (from any era) will exceed the durability of most cars being chased during an average pursuit.

Agreed. The PCD cruisers were far and away the best vehicles of their type. They survived in a high abuse situation remarkably well. The overall reliability of the 383 and 440 engines for police work is well documented. Many of the failures of engines were the result of inadequate routine service procedures. A typical cruiser spent 4-6 hours per shift idling by the side of a highway someplace. Your typical motor pool would bring them in for service about every 4k in mileage. The actual hours of service was then at least double what it should have been. In a perfect world, the cruisers should have had hour meters to more accurately set the service interval. Far as I know that never happened. Another issue was that many police motor pools purchased their oils on a low bid basis, the quality of some bulk oils was highly suspect.

Dave
 
I hope that this means that the car is in good hands...cl link displays:

This posting has been deleted by its author.
 
It was the 80's and mine had some tweaks to bring it as close as I could to the 69 spec 440 Super Commando/ Magnum/ TNT , which I believe was the ultimate stock 440 combo (multi carbs I've always found to be a bugger to get tuned right.) and it did not have a Holley (because I loath Holleys...so Chevy). It was still pulling like a SOB at 120 mph.

About the Holley carb... on my second 1968 PK21, ($100 ex 440 Maryland SP unmarked TYVM) had to do some Interstate driving to get it home and traffic was rush hour so cud'int go too crazy, but driving around town for the next 2 weeks got me cussing as I thought the damn secondary's weren't opening (vac). Wasn't till I got it somewhere that it could stretch it legs so to say... he he nothing wrong with the secondary system they just opened up at 120mph! Nice howl sound too.
Played around with some lighter springs but didn't really notice any difference.
Don't really understand the hate for the Holley carb, they were the carb of the day and after I swapped my 440 6bbl into the Maryland car and got sick of the 4 to 6 mpg & 12mpg max (gas was heading to 'gasp' 75¢ a gallon) I put the blue manifold & Holley on it, RESULTS!
On one recorded run at a average cruising speed of 95mph gas consumption was 15mpg with that little Holley. These 440 SP cars would have no problem 'Pining Out' the speedo. :D
 
About the Holley carb... on my second 1968 PK21, ($100 ex 440 Maryland SP unmarked TYVM) had to do some Interstate driving to get it home and traffic was rush hour so cud'int go too crazy, but driving around town for the next 2 weeks got me cussing as I thought the damn secondary's weren't opening (vac). Wasn't till I got it somewhere that it could stretch it legs so to say... he he nothing wrong with the secondary system they just opened up at 120mph! Nice howl sound too.
Played around with some lighter springs but didn't really notice any difference.
Don't really understand the hate for the Holley carb, they were the carb of the day and after I swapped my 440 6bbl into the Maryland car and got sick of the 4 to 6 mpg & 12mpg max (gas was heading to 'gasp' 75¢ a gallon) I put the blue manifold & Holley on it, RESULTS!
On one recorded run at a average cruising speed of 95mph gas consumption was 15mpg with that little Holley. These 440 SP cars would have no problem 'Pining Out' the speedo. :D

The vacuum secondaries on those carbs were a pain in the butt. Your experience with the secondaries opening at 120mph was fairly typical. The carbs used velocity vacuum to open the secondaries and the passage was too small and not placed properly to draw enough vacuum to overcome the spring tension holding the secondaries closed. Holley did offer a weaker spring package, but that was ineffective. Later a manual secondary conversion was also offered that improved overall performance significantly. Back in the day, most of us tossed that Holley in favor of a 750cfm to 850cfm Holley double pumper and that made a real difference in performance at low and high end. With a good after market intake such as a Tarantula, it was easy to bump the stock horsepower to the 390-400 hp range without having the gas mileage go thru the floor. I do not hate Holley carbs, just the stock one they put on the 440.

Dave
 
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