The 1984 Rampage
Old pics (2010)-
Cliff Ramdell purchased the car in Florida in 2004 as a project for his son. Cliff ended up assembling it for his wife and she drove it for a time but it largely sat and was sold to one of the SDAC-NE chapter members in 2011 and went to Maine where it didn't get a lot of miles put on it. When Cliff got it the Rampage was already Cadillac pearl white and had door poppers and electric windows. He said the wiring was pretty funky at the time so installed a GLHS wiring harness.
Here is a copy of the ad from 2010;
1984 Dodge Rampage:
We bought this car in Florida, the fall of 2004 as a project for my son Matt. He got it apart and kinda ran out of steam so I bought the car from him and finished it and gave it to my wife. She drove it some but with moving and a new house it hasn't been driven for the last year or so. It's time for a new home.
This is a nice clean truck with very little needed to make it complete. The only little rust was a spot on the passenger floor that I cut out and welded in a patch, seam sealed and undercoated. There is a small half dollar size spot on the cowl just in front of the windshield that needs attention. The paint is a Cadillac white pearl and it is showing wear in some areas and has some scuffs and marks but overall is still very nice and shows well. The door handles, power windows and paint were done before we bought the truck. Antenna is missing
I don't have the kick panels and the paint under the hood is pealing. Looks like it was painted before the motor swap and not at the same time as the truck itself because it's a different shade of white.
I drove this truck quite a bit in the first year and a half and it was always a dependable driver so you could come and drive it home with no problems. Here is a list of what's been done, it needs nothing mechanically unless you don't like the tight torque converter. I have a spare pair of tires with the car.
Motor/Trans/drivetrain:
1984 2.2 T1 motor w/bathtub head. New headgasket, cam seals, timing belt, water
pump.
1 piece gasket valve cover
'89 TII intake
TII turbo w/ large wastegate can
Braided turbo lines
+20% injectors
Transmission rebuilt with 5 clutch front, 4 clutch rear, 3.4 KD lever, small
spline diff, low stall convertor (light car so no need for a high stall unit)
Shelby Lancer front mount transmission cooler.
Rebuilt axles
New radiator
Car is set up as a non intercooled and has VNT
BOV that limits boost to 14 psi.
2 1/2" exhaust with converter and flowmaster muffler.
Walbro 190 pump
Mopar Performance GLHS Stage 2 computer
Body/chassis:
Shelby Charger nose & ground effects
GLHS under hood wiring harness
GLHS dash and under dash harness
Complete interior from '87 GLHS except Rampage specific items which were all
painted to match the dark gray color.
Shaved door handles with electric poppers
Power windows
White face gauge decals
2 gauge pod with White face Auto meter boost and A/F gauge
GLHS front springs & KYB shocks
Monroe Rear shocks
White 15x6 pumpers with 205/50/15 tires
New calipers, pads and rotors
Trip home (2015)
The Rampage came up for sale in 2015; an SDAC-NE member was selling off all his Shelby Dodge inventory and I picked up pretty much everything I could carry off. When we got the Rampage home it didn't show a lot of miles on it since Cliff sold it but had several issues; it skipped, it leaked oil, was missing the lower radiator hose and the original rims were gone.
My wife took one look at it and asked if she could have it... sigh. She treats me good so now we have a Rampage added to the fleet.
Present (2015-2016)
First order of business was to get it running: I obtained a lower radiator hose and fixed some coolant leaks. Repaired a valve cover leak. Installed a door handle in the drivers door as the poppers were no longer functioning. Installed a radio antenna. Installed the hoses for the turbo and air cleaner. Purchased new tires and outfitted it with '88 Turbo II Daytona "Crab" wheels. It had a skip and a compression test showed cylinder number three was pretty much dead.
Well that will leave a mark.
Stripping down the engine it was found that the piston for cylinder number three was broke from crown to skirt. I lucked out and found a set of Sealed Power 84-85 standard bore pistons and repaired the engine. At the same time I replaced some engine seals, replaced the flat slider cam with a roller cam, replaced the large 89 turbocharger wastegate can with an 87-88 small can to limit boost and did a custom GLHS calibration more suited to the "bath tub" cylinder head.
Since then it has had a bunch of rattles fixed, the white cluster ended up being replaced with a GLHS unit as the speedometer was erratic and some of the gauges off (from pulling the needles to add the white faces I suspect) and I'm in the process of replacing the radio with an AM/FM/MP3 unit.
January 2016
Removed the dead stereo amp under the passenger seat, pulled the stereo, reworked the speaker wiring, installed a Pyle AM/FM/MP3 player. Fixed a coolant leak and flushed the heater core. Found a Pentastar, cleaned and painted it and installed in on the front clip where it belongs. Repaired the radiator support where the spot welds had broken at the bottom. Found some speed nuts to secure the passenger seat which was held in with just 2 bolts. Tweaked the base idle speed. Fixed some minor rattles.
How it looks today January 9th 2016