Welcome to 2025, Autopians! We’ve been in this new year a little longer than most of you, what with Australia being 16 hours ahead of the US East Coast. So far, so good with the exception of some fires raging down in parts of the country closer to Autopian writer Lewin. Hopefully there might be some rain on the way to keep the fire risk down as our hot summer weather is also drying things out around here in Central Western New South Wales.
I thought I would use this New Year to get something off my chest: back in October, after I put out the 2nd Anniversary update on everyone’s favourite feral utility, Project Cactus, I had what we call around here a big old stuff-up.
This isn’t the first time I’ve had a failure with Project Cactus following an anniversary article, after the first such article last year the old ignition coil decided to cark it at a mate’s farm.
[Ed Note: Australian is its own language. -DT].
A Rare Score
To set the scene, earlier in the year I had some luck on Facebook Marketplace and was able to snag one of the high-priority parts for my Regal SE build: a Chrysler A518/46RH automatic transmission that was for sale over 500 miles away on the Gold Coast up in sunny Queensland.
This transmission was used in Dodge Rams and Dakota pickups in the early ’90s. These trucks were not sold here and only small numbers would have been imported back in the day and then be required to be converted to right-hand-drive as they were under 30 years old at the time. Other than Ford importing and assembling F-trucks in fits and starts from kits in the mid-20th century, the only way to get a US pickup in Australia was to import a complete vehicle from the States and have it converted by a specialist here.
The importation and RHD conversion pushed the total price up on such vehicles to the equivalent of a small house and meant that only those with a specialized need such as some farmers or tradespeople would spend the money to obtain such a vehicle. These vehicles now being imported by the US Big Three (with Toyota Tundras also incoming for 2025) and converted in Aussie factories or coming in already RHD with manufacturer-backed warranties has drastically lowered the entry price versus the old days.
[Editor’s Note: I need to know the story behind those weird additional turn signals in the grille there; some Aussie rules? – JT]
The A518 was based on the extraordinarily-strong A727 transmission, which with small-block V8s was used in trucks and police vehicles (but with the addition of an overdrive and a lock-up torque converter). This ‘box should drop my highway rpm by 30% and have the 318ci/5.2L V8 humming at around 2,000 rpm at 68 mph/110 kph as opposed to the standard setup’s 2,800 rpm or so on stock 185/70/R14 tyres. I plan to get this another hundred or more rpm lower with some taller 15-inch wheels and tyres which will also add some more grip in the rear.
This has to be the most 90’s corporate video I have ever seen! Hard to take seriously since it’s got one of the blokes behind the ‘Retro Encabulator‘ video!
My uncle lives about 2 hrs south of the ‘Goldie’, and was able to grab this transmission for me that is rare-to-Oz. A mate of his was then able to bring it within an hour or so east of my place over the Labour Day long weekend (the first weekend in October here in New South Wales). All I had to do was head over to where he was staying and pick it up in Project Cactus.
Eve of Destruction
I waited for my partner and Suzuki Mighty Boy enthusiast, Bek, to get home from work so we could head over and probably go grab a pub feed over at Dunedoo, as the famous pie shop and other eateries would be closed by the time we passed through. While waiting, I did the usual checks of the oil, tyre pressures, coolant, brake fluid and made sure we had a full toolkit and spare tyre in the behind-seat storage area.
I had a phone call and went inside for a bit, with Bek getting home shortly afterward. Once she was ready I pulled Cactus out of the shed and we started to make our way East.
Driving through town, all seemed fine with our crusty conveyance. It was once we reached the edge of town and hit highway speeds that things went wrong immediately.
Before we had reached 50 mph, all we could see — right in front of our faces — was the surviving lichen on the weathered bonnet in far-too-close-up, instead of the rural Australian road and scenery.
After doing my under-bonnet checks, I had neglected to reinstall either of the two bonnet retaining clips (aka hood pins)!
The bonnet had flipped up past 90 degrees, bending the hinges and causing damage to the scuttle/plenum panel as well as tearing the area around the bolt attachments in the bonnet. Fortunately the windscreen and A-pillars/roof were unscathed.
I had added a keeper wire after nearly losing one of the clips/pins on the Chryslers On The Murray trip back in 2023 and seeing the bonnet rise scarily on one side back then. I was always careful to make sure the clips were installed since, but with the phone call I must have missed this critical step and assumed that with the bonnet down, we were good to go.
The original bonnet hook and spring-loaded catch were all but completely destroyed (a weakness with these era bonnets) before we started the build, so there is no secondary latching mechanism at present.
I quickly pulled over and assessed the damage. With the bent hinges, the bonnet wouldn’t close enough to attach a ratchet strap so we decided to unbolt it and place it in the tray (AKA “bed”) so we could drive back home, Roadkill-style:
I parked Cactus back in the shed and grabbed the work vehicle to go and get the transmission we had set out to pick up:
In the light of the next morning, I could see how badly the bonnet had been ripped:
I set the bonnet aside and started looking through my parts stash for some replacement bonnet hinges. When I restored my Charger I had replaced the hinges with a set that seemed to be ‘tighter’ in the riveted joint and had set the originals aside, still painted in Ford Tropicana Green from their shitty 90’s paint job. These original hinges also still had working springs, so a plan was forming that would both get Cactus operational again as well as improving the functionality of this revived ride of refuse and recycling that should prevent a repeat of this current debacle.
From ’68 or so until the end in ’81, all Aussie Chrysler Valiants had clock-springs to hold the bonnet up at full lift to keep a good couple-dozen kilos from slamming on your noggin while you check the oil or want to hear the valvetrain clatter in surround sound. Relatively compact and strong, these springs have a habit of walking off their mounting pin, instantly losing tension and slamming the hood down at high speed.
When we built Cactus, I didn’t trust the wobbly hinges we had to keep their springs properly located and preemptively removed their tension. This meant that we had to use a prop to keep the bonnet open, with a bit of flat-pack shelf metal being just the ticket. I had the same setup in my ute, Lenny since the bonnet springs had done that dance not long after roadworthy!
Having learned a few new tricks since building Project Cactus, I decided to try and eliminate this weakness and installed washers and cotter pins to keep the springs from going walkabout:
From here, it took some careful use of a cold chisel (the tool, not the band) to remove the spring washers/clips that retain the damaged hinges from factory. I didn’t want to remove the front panels and bullbar to install the new hinges, so it took some careful drilling and use of more washers and cotter pins to install the replacement hinges:
Now that we had hinges, it was time to get the bonnet repaired and back on. I took the bonnet back to our good mates at IronKnuckles, and absolute legend Henry set about reversing the damage caused before quickly fabbing up some reinforcing plates to strengthen what was an already very weak area on the bonnet:
Now that there were working bonnet springs, the old shelf bracket bonnet-prop could be retired:
To prevent this debacle happening again, as a rule the bonnet is either up or if it is closed for any reason the clips go in straight away. I am looking to sort out a secondary latch, the bonnet will likely need reinforcing before this could be reliably used to hold up to highway speeds. I have toyed with safety cables like this one, but of course that still requires you to manually latch to the radiator support or similar and could just as easily be missed if one gets distracted.
Back in action, I used Project Cactus over the holidays to move a decent-sized apricot tree that I had given a good trim and I’m starting to plan the next round of improvements to this ute and another potential long-distance roadtrip.
Project Cactus may have been bruised by my slip-up, but I won’t allow this ute to be beaten or defeated!
I hope your entry into 2025 has been a good one. Remember, nobody survives life, so get out there and live!
All photos courtesy of the author unless otherwise noted. Top graphic road background via Depositphotos.com
I thought I should clarify something that may have confused some readers based on the headline (I didn’t write the hed). Cactus currently uses bonnet/hood pins with R-clips as the sole retention method as the original spring loaded catch and safety latch are badly damaged and commonly rip out of these era bonnets. I hadn’t inserted either R-clip into the pins that fateful evening with resulting damage.
I am looking to either make a beefed-up version of the stock latch, or run something else as a secondary to further prevent this happening again.For now, using the procedure outlined in the article of always inserting the clips when the bonnet is down will hopefully prevent the same stuff-up I had in October.
So far you have two votes for electromagnets 😀
Laurence, may I suggest merely adding some type of external spring loaded catch using the brush-bar? That would make it pretty darn idiot proof.
The ingenuity of everyone on team Cactus is astounding, and just a little bit crazy too.
[Editor’s Note: I need to know the story behind those weird additional turn signals in the grille there; some Aussie rules? – JT]
Unless I can see the lamps illuminated, I suspect that the “turn signal indicators” in the bumpers are repurposed as position lamps as the US headlamp capsules aren’t equipped with the integrated position lamps. See this ECE headlamp capsule with such one (under the H4 bulb). Australia allows those US headlamps as long as they are “repointed” to the left (no idea how is it accomplished other than moving the bulb shield accordingly).
Additionally, the US turn signal indicators and brake lamps have somewhat narrower output angle that doesn’t comply with UN-ECE WP.29 regulations (Australia adopted most of the regulations and implemented them in its Australian Design Rules). This regulation is the reason for the bulging taillamps on European Ford Cougar. Some countries are “tolerant” of the US lighting regulations and allow them per se.
I shared my Spec Miata for an endurance race. My co-driver side-smacked an RX7 in the Road Atlanta esses which sheared off the hood pins. He made it around to the front straight before the air and vibrations did their magic. Watching your race car’s hood smash into the windshield and fiberglass top at 100mph is a memorable experience.
Was driving home on I-80 through Sacramento when we saw a young woman in a smaller Japanese car going slow in the #2 lane with her turn signal on. The hood had blown up to the windshield and totally blocked her forward view. She calmly pulled over to the shoulder as traffic allowed (fortunately, no slowdowns in front of her). I slowed and put on my 4-way flashers to warn traffic behind me. I thought she did a good job of maintaining her cool in the face of catastrophe.