What Makes a Police Fury a Pursuit Car?

I believe the unit-body did receive extra body welds, as well as the stub-frame. This is in addition to the roof support for the light bar. Also, in addition the chassis were "tuned" per fleet order specs. I.E. Californai CHP, or State of Virginia VSP. My VSP build sheet has "Special Tires/Special Chassis" on the bottom. Also my 69 CHP car like Alan's is a "noise suppression" car, and the chassis was "tuned" to CHP specific specifications.

I happen to have a 69 Fury III next to my 69 Fury I Pursuit. I will go over the pinch welds on the rockers this weekend and count the number per inch to see if there are any differences. They were built in the same month at the same plant.

It seems that a lot of Plymouth Pursuits and Patrol units and Fleet orders were built in May. That seems to be standard SOP for MoPar fleet orders.

Here are some fun facts and photos from my humble archive of the Plymouth Police Fleet.

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I can't find pictures of the stub frame I sold but I don't recall it being any different.
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Likewise the body structure, I can look again as I haven't spent much time underneath but I don't recall anything special.


Alan
 
Here's a BS from a 69 DK car. The engine assembly is 919 indicating the C body L code 440-HP, auto transmission and A/C.

I do not have a broadcast sheet from a non "police" 440 HP C body to compare it to.

Does anyone have a broadcast sheet from a 69 non 'police' C body with 440 HP, automatic and A/C so we can compare the engine assembly numbers?
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There are a few on this board with a 69 440 HP in Polara dress
 
I have a 72 Polara Cop car 440 T code with an 818 listed in the broadcast sheet.
 
I have heard the following from someone who built the motors for the police cars back in the day at the factory. In addition to the attendant heavy duty suspension cooling and brake components that cop cars were equipped with, police motors were built on a separate assembly line.

The motors were not specifically any different from street motors and no special cam shafts or high compression heads or extra special valves etc were used as is often rumoured. The only difference from a street motor was the fact that all the parts were hand picked and balanced and then assembled to what is termed "design tolerances" - essentially a factory balanced and blueprinted motor. This hand built attention to detail went to all the components of the engine, from head - as opposed to the quick style "grab 8 pistons and rods from the bin and slap it together" assembly line. Other procedures like super rinsing the blocks out to remove casting sand etc were performed as well.

This is not to say that a well put together factory street motor couldn't perform as well as a cop motor... and given the way things were, one would think that the odd street motor did make it out with the right selection of parts and a well fed and watered worker in a good mood just after lunch on a Wednesday putting it together and all went well... and of course we've all heard the stories out there to back that up! lol... "yeah - my friend's uncle's second cousin had a Newport that the cops could never catch"... that sort of thing.

As for the difference between a street motor and a cop motor? Well, my 66 Monaco 440 4-speed has a factory police motor in it, and the difference is STARTLING to say the least. I have yet to find the top end in it - I run out of stones well before the car does... and as for off the line performance, this video will say a lot - after gently walking the car out I simply put my foot down, in gear, at 20 mph, and the near 5,000 pound car just anhilates the tires. At the time the car was running its' original points distributor too...



The guy who took the video had at the time a 68 300 with the 440 Super Commando 375 horse motor and a Torqueflite in it. He was following me to go to MoparFest, and when we got on the on ramps to the highway, I would just put my foot down in 3rd, and he said I just pulled away from him as if he was going backwards. He was HARD in it, floored, winding it out passing gear, and just knew it was hopeless to try and keep up. We got up to our shenanigans in the video on the way home... tee hee hee!!


From my frame of reference, "Design Tolerances" is a wide open door. DTs are just that - the upper and lower limits for the characteristic being measured on a particular part. As I mentioned earlier, cylinder bore and piston DTs were 4/10,000" per size, and for a while there were 12 sizes. All of this was related to the inability of the equipment being used at the time being able to do any better. Cylinders were measured for shape (barrel/hourglass), size (at 6 points down the cylinder wall) and orientation (squareness to the crankbores). Shape measurements I hope are obvious. Not too much of either. Size had tolerances for differences between the individual points as well as overall and orientation related to vertical tilt from the ideal 45°. Crankshafts were measured for main journal size, out of round, taper and runout - at 3 points on each journal. The journal with the thrust bearing also measured size and orientation of the thrust walls to the journal. Pin/conn rod journals were measured for the same characteristics as the mains but at 5 points. All bearing surfaces were measured for surface finish. In Fusie times, that would have been 0-10 microinches on the journals and up to 15 on the thrust walls. The oil seal diameter was measured at two points for size and out of round, plus there was a tolerance on the grooves pressed into the surface that helped with slinging oil away from the seal itself. Camshaft journals were measured for diameter at three points for the same characteristics as other round bearing surfaces with a surface finish of 0-6 microinches. Cam lobes were measured for profile which covered base circle diameter, ramp profiles, lift and also taper on the lobes (taper was designed in to help the lifters rotate in their bores in the block) as well as surface finish. Conn rods were checked for diameter at both ends in 3 places for size, out of round and taper. There were also checks for the center distance between the crank and pin bores as well as for bend and twist in the beam of the rod itself. Each end of the rod also had a weight tolerance which helped with balance of the rotating assembly. There was a surface finish tolerance as well. Assembly of the piston and rod involved measuring the pin bores of the piston, the pin end of the rod and the wrist pin itself. A very early version of a computer with several dozen meters on it measured each piston and rod and picked from one of 6 wrist pins for the optimal clearance of the pin in the piston bores. Most conn rod assemblies from this time were semi-floating, meaning that the pin was a friction fit in the rod and the piston was free to move slightly back and forth to settle itself in the bore. Because the pistons were checked for weight prior to assembly as were both ends of the rod, the completed assembly was taken to be in tolerance for the finished sub-assembly. Similarly, flywheels for either an automatic or a manual transmission were also dynamically balanced as a stand alone part. I forgot to mention that crankshafts were dynamically balanced as well and that's why you'll see holes drilled into the counterweights and crankpins to accomplish this. When the engine was being assembled, there were two or three (can't recall exactly) checks for torque to turn (ttt) as the reciprocating assembly was built up. Those that were too high were pulled apart to find out why. In Fusie times, ttt for a finished short block was about 35-50'/lbs. On a modern engine it's about 5-7'/lbs. One of the things that were just beginning to be explored in the very early 70s was bore distortion as the engine was built up. Cylinder block casting has improved drastically, even as the block continues to get lighter and lighter. Long story short, bore distortion was affected every time another component was added to the engine. Small changes as the short block was built up, but big changes when the cylinder heads were bolted on, and really, really big changes occurred when the intake manifold was installed and torqued up. Every time I see somebody bolt a plate onto the carb mounting face of an engine to lift it out of a car, I just cringe. The stresses that creates internally are eye popping. Please people bolt your chains to the block!
 
I believe the unit-body did receive extra body welds, as well as the stub-frame. This is in addition to the roof support for the light bar. Also, in addition the chassis were "tuned" per fleet order specs. I.E. Californai CHP, or State of Virginia VSP. My VSP build sheet has "Special Tires/Special Chassis" on the bottom. Also my 69 CHP car like Alan's is a "noise suppression" car, and the chassis was "tuned" to CHP specific specifications.

I happen to have a 69 Fury III next to my 69 Fury I Pursuit. I will go over the pinch welds on the rockers this weekend and count the number per inch to see if there are any differences. They were built in the same month at the same plant.

It seems that a lot of Plymouth Pursuits and Patrol units and Fleet orders were built in May. That seems to be standard SOP for MoPar fleet orders.

Here are some fun facts and photos from my humble archive of the Plymouth Police Fleet.

So the '69 360 horse set up was basically an uprated K code.

Thanks.
 
Here's a BS from a 69 DK car. The engine assembly is 919 indicating the C body L code 440-HP, auto transmission and A/C.

I do not have a broadcast sheet from a non "police" 440 HP C body to compare it to.

Does anyone have a broadcast sheet from a 69 non 'police' C body with 440 HP, automatic and A/C so we can compare the engine assembly numbers?
View attachment 114743

Broadcast sheets are going to solve a lot of mysteries and answer a lot of questions. And yes, by all means blank out the sequence portion of the vin. There could be 1000 DK41L91 cars, it's the sequence number that makes a car unique. Are there any Mound Road/Trenton Engine guys on this board? What would be absolutely great to have (even more than a whole bunch of broadcast sheets) is a copy of each of the engine plants' graphics books. These are the documents that spell out how each engine is assembled, with what parts, to what torques (and the tolerances for the torques) and it will identify the engines by those all important last 3 digits of the production part number. This particular sheet calls out the last 3 digits as "919" but it also refers to the engine as an E86. It would be just fascinating to find out if there were different versions of an E86 used in the same body shell. I would fully expect that a "C" body E86 would not be entirely the same as a "B" body E86. The graphics books, and to a lesser extent, the broadcast sheets will provide the answer(s).
 
Broadcast sheets are going to solve a lot of mysteries and answer a lot of questions. And yes, by all means blank out the sequence portion of the vin. There could be 1000 DK41L91 cars, it's the sequence number that makes a car unique. Are there any Mound Road/Trenton Engine guys on this board? What would be absolutely great to have (even more than a whole bunch of broadcast sheets) is a copy of each of the engine plants' graphics books. These are the documents that spell out how each engine is assembled, with what parts, to what torques (and the tolerances for the torques) and it will identify the engines by those all important last 3 digits of the production part number. This particular sheet calls out the last 3 digits as "919" but it also refers to the engine as an E86. It would be just fascinating to find out if there were different versions of an E86 used in the same body shell. I would fully expect that a "C" body E86 would not be entirely the same as a "B" body E86. The graphics books, and to a lesser extent, the broadcast sheets will provide the answer(s).

Agreeed!
 
So the '69 360 horse set up was basically an uprated K code.

Thanks.

Yes, and no. Because it was a Police Pursuit application only there may have been differences in actual assembly procedures or quality assurance. Otherwise it's an upgraded K code 440.
 
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Yes, and no. Because it was a Police Pursuit application only there may have been differences in actual assembly procedures or quality assurance. Otherwise it's an upgraded K code 440.

If it's a different assembly, the BS will tell us. If there are differences in how it was assembled, we'd need some seriously hard to find documentation to prove it. If it's the same assembly as a standard K code, we're looking at smoke and mirror fudging HP ratings.
 
Broadcast sheets are going to solve a lot of mysteries and answer a lot of questions. And yes, by all means blank out the sequence portion of the vin. There could be 1000 DK41L91 cars, it's the sequence number that makes a car unique. Are there any Mound Road/Trenton Engine guys on this board? What would be absolutely great to have (even more than a whole bunch of broadcast sheets) is a copy of each of the engine plants' graphics books. These are the documents that spell out how each engine is assembled, with what parts, to what torques (and the tolerances for the torques) and it will identify the engines by those all important last 3 digits of the production part number. This particular sheet calls out the last 3 digits as "919" but it also refers to the engine as an E86. It would be just fascinating to find out if there were different versions of an E86 used in the same body shell. I would fully expect that a "C" body E86 would not be entirely the same as a "B" body E86. The graphics books, and to a lesser extent, the broadcast sheets will provide the answer(s).

There are numerous versions of sales code E86. The 440 HP was installed in A, B, C, and E bodies in various combinations taking into account the body application, the transmission, AC or not, plus 4bbl and 6 bbl intake. Each combination will have a year specific assembly code.
 
Kevin said: From my frame of reference, "Design Tolerances" is a wide open door.

I entirely agree, and you certainly have way more of a frame of reference and experience and the attendant knowlege than I'll ever have! :) All I was and am doing was parroting the information and words used by my two sources. I have little knowlege of the actual practises used at the time, and certainly understand that even then, certain terms and practises allowed for variance. As to the accuracy or truth to all of that, I can't speak with any authority whatsoever, and everyone needs to understand that. I am NOT an authority with regards to this and hope no one thinks that I am saying I am! (does that make sense?) :)

That being said, my engine is frick'n powerful and a heck of a lot of fun to drive!! :lol:
 
Kevin said: From my frame of reference, "Design Tolerances" is a wide open door.

I entirely agree, and you certainly have way more of a frame of reference and experience and the attendant knowlege than I'll ever have! :) All I was and am doing was parroting the information and words used by my two sources. I have little knowlege of the actual practises used at the time, and certainly understand that even then, certain terms and practises allowed for variance. As to the accuracy or truth to all of that, I can't speak with any authority whatsoever, and everyone needs to understand that. I am NOT an authority with regards to this and hope no one thinks that I am saying I am! (does that make sense?) :)

That being said, my engine is frick'n powerful and a heck of a lot of fun to drive!! :lol:

Ross: Not trying to start a ruckus, just adding my 2c worth. Every piece of a car has a design tolerance for every characteristic identified on that particular part's blueprint(s) and there are tolerances for panel alignment gaps on a finished body, how well other parts fit together and so on. A long departed friend of mine started as a process engineer at Lynch Road in the fall of 1956 as the 1957 cars were going into production. Somehow a '57 Fury was pulled off the line and checked for a bunch of basic dimensions. Turns out the car was 2½" LONGER than it was meant to be. Long story short, the car was the product of every major body component being at the upper limit of the tolerance for dimensions affecting the car's length. Call it a freak occurrence or whatever term you like, it was an example of what could happen. Theoretically a car with all body panels at the minimum/lower tolerance would be about the same distance less than what it was meant to be.

When an engine is "blueprinted", it is assembled with all dimensions at the ideal for a particular purpose. If you're building an engine for maximum power/racing, you put the smallest possible pistons in the largest possible bores and you're prepared to live with a whole lot of piston slap until the engine is fully warmed up. Just about every other dimension inside the engine is optimized for the type of engine you're trying to build. Cam and ignition timing make a difference as well (plus the lift and duration of the cam lobes). Rotating parts, especially the crank, pistons and rods would all be at the lowest/lightest limits. Normal production might be OK with a crank being within 3-5 grams of being perfectly balanced. In a blueprinted engine, crank balance would be as close to 0 as possible. Pistons and rods would be as close to the middle of the tolerance for their weight as possible. The end result is as you point out, an engine that's really powerful and a ton of fun to drive.
 
"Ross: Not trying to start a ruckus, just adding my 2c worth."

No worries! No ruckus found anywhere! :thumbsup:

The value of your info is worth far more than 2c!

Interesting story about the 57 Fury!
 
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