- this time on road kill, we're doing donuts in a dodge challenger. - and proving that youcan take a dirt track car, run it with no gear oil, andget a fraction of the way home. - what is the proof? (laughs) (engine revvs) (upbeat music) - [mike] isn't it summer?
- is it? - it's supposed to be. - it's like june. - it's june, and i'm wearing pants. - [david] right now, we'rein the far-flung outskirts of forest grove, oregon,and there's some people here who have tons of cool mopars, one of which is a 70 dodge challenger dirt track car, and our plan here is toget it running and driving,
hope to not get arrestedwhile we drive the thing all the way back home onas much dirt as possible. - how's it going? - good, how are you? - david freiburger. - jamie kidwell, pleased to meet you. - jamie, and you're julie? - yes. - nice to meet you.
- thanks for connecting; nice to meet you. - hi, julie. - nice to meet you, julie. - wow. - this is it? - this is it. - [david] when we werethinking about what to do on this episode of roadkill,we were kind of at a loss, and so i went to the fans.
i made a post on facebook that said, "do you have anythingcool that you can sell us that can be made to run and drive in a couple days that'saround 3,000 bucks?" and i got something like 300 responses, but the stand out wasthis 70 dodge challenger dirt track car that was up in oregon. - [mike] here's the rubabout this whole plan: we've only got four days,we've never seen this car,
and we don't really wantto take the highway home. ideally, we'd like to coverthe 1,000 mile road trip mostly on dirt, so we'vegot our work cut out for us. - is it going to run and drive? - yeah, it hasn't been runningin a little over a year. - [mike] okay. - [jamie] it hasn't beenon a racetrack in 10. but yeah, it'll run. i remember this car whenit was running around town.
an older lady drove it, and i mean, it was out in timber for 400bucks, running and driving. - look, the doors are welded. - everything's welded, man. - yeah, it's all welded up. - [jamie] quite a few guys up here ran these e bodies on the dirt. - wow, that's a screw-together roll cage. - it is a screw-together roll cage.
- no. - yeah, look at it, there's a pipe turn, you fit it together. - [david] that's worse thanthe cross bar in the blasphemy. - [mike] wow. - this one's the norm, man. - [jamie] it still is in a lot of cases. - [mike] i like it; it's got character. - it's got character.
- having general mayhem flashbacks now. did this come out of a motor home? - no, that's the original motor. - [jamie] yeah, i'm sureit's still under the car. - yeah. - so what are your odds onus getting back to la in it? - pretty good. - [david] really? - pretty good, yeah.
- the better questionis, what are our odds of surviving a crash in this thing? - [david] cool, i'm kind of stoked. - [mike] yeah, this thing's cool. - yeah, it's different. - [mike] jamie is a certified mopar freak. everything from trucks tocars, parts, you name it, he had it and he wanted to show it to us. - [mike] you have better stufflying around on the ground
than most people have on their cars. - [david] wow, this is totally old school. - it is; that's how it's going to stay. - wow, that's a cool cab. - [david] i had no idea it was that... - [jamie] that was a state of oregon sanding truck, just on mount hood. - [david] wow, i've never seen this gear badge before either.
- [jamie] yeah, isn't that cool? - that's super cool. oh, that's sweet; wow. how come all mopar guys are like this? - cause we're sick. - what is the deal with that, though? - sick. - i can't remember last night at the bar, and you can tell a story about
every one of these cars you own. - i can. - you don't see the dodgeschool bus too often. - [jamie] mmm-mmm. - hey look, kitchen sink. - everything and. - if i had this kind of property, this is probably who i'dbe, what it would look like. except for less organized,and with less valuable stuff.
(sighs) - okay, what do we need to get started? it's a lot more complete than i thought. is it literally just goingto fire up and drive? - [jamie] i'd buy some points for it. - points? okay. - battery, electrical kit. - starting fluid? - [mike] sawzall and a lot of blades.
(david chuckles) - [mike] look at this. it's day one, there's a car, here's parts. it almost looks like we planned ahead. i'm sure they all fit perfectly, too. right about now, i'm about to make sure that that cage neverhurts anyone ever again. (saw whirs) look at that, you're addingperformance; wow, thunk.
i feel like it won't be arace car with no roll cage. this is sketchy. - wow; they measured that asan earthquake in california. (soft music) - [mike] bonk! - [david] we're cutting a roll cage out. it was in our way; itwas an inconvenience. - yeah, we weren't goingto be able to start it with the roll cage in there;can i have a new blade?
- this is dumb. (david grunts) - all right now, i am lookingfor battery terminals, because ours are shot; youcan't even tighten them down. hmmm, i'll just leave that there. - fire it up. - [david] where is that starting fluid? - there's no spark. - nothing.
- [david] so, are thepoints opening and closing? - [david] yeah, they are. - [david] okay. - [mike] dead coil? - [mike] nope, it's still not sparking. - [voiceover] sadly, ittook less time to cut out the plumber's special rollcage from the challenger than it did to get the motor running. we probably should've listenedto jamie three hours earlier
when he said, "those points are shot." - first thing when we walked up, jamie was telling fry, youbetter get some points, so we opened up the cab, and was like, "oh, they look fine, they're like new." - apparently we didn't want to hear it. - ready? - okay. - that is welled up.
- i'm going to pour a lot of gas in there, just want you to know. that's pretty good. (mike chuckles) - what was that? (mike and david chuckle) - that was running onacorns, that's what that was. (david laughs) - what is all that dust?
we're probably blowing all sorts of rats and stuff out of it. - [david] oh, what? hey, it's running. - it's running. (mike laughs) - yay! - sounds like a motor home. - well, it's like 6:30 at this point.
i don't know why, we'rejust not moving fast today. - let's recap; what did we accomplish? we bought a car, we cut out a roll cage, we made an engine run. an engine that was already in a car, wired, plummed, ready to go. so yeah, tomorrow david reallyneeds to pick up the pace, you know, hold up his end of the bargain. - [david] at some pointin our mania, we realize
the carborator is complete crap. it's totally clogged,and we're not fixing it. - yeah, this carborator hasbeen sitting outside forever. there's so much, like,llama hair in it and stuff. - [david] probably llama spit too. - [mike] so we ran into town and burned up the rest of our budget to buy a brand new carborator. - we kind of want toget on the road today,
and parts is parts. - gauges are installed. - [david] i like it. hold on. - i don't want to half-assthis installation. - there we go. - [david] this thing runsway too quiet for us. - it's quiet. - maybe it'll get louderwhen it overheats.
- it runs all right. well, we could put the seats in. - yeah, it runs good enough to keep going. - fix the wiring, and thengo to the parts store. - fix it on the road. - [mike] well, our $28,000 mopar has turned out to be apretty good car; it runs. well really, that's all it does right now. we don't know if it stops,we don't know if it shifts,
we don't know if it steers, we don't know if it drives straight. so we're going to put headlights on it, cause that's what you do next. - have you even, like, grazed your foot across the brake pedal yet? - nah, there's no reason to do that. - it's an automatic; don't need brakes. whoa.
that's right, you keep walking. is he coming back, no? all right, cool. - so, technically it should run right now. - [mike] yeah; so what you got here is the very finest in redneck engineering. this is a free, not quiteinstalled, battery mount. these are switches we bought for about $4, combined with a whole bunch of wiring we probably paid too muchfor, all zip-tied together.
that's the ignition,that's the headlights. you want yourself someleft or right turn signal, you're just a click away. oh, you got to stop,you want to warn people? put 'em together, there'syour brake lights. (mike and david laugh) - i think we're finallyready to leave in this turd. we have to run, put some tires on it, and hopefully get a front end alignment,
because it's all changedup for circle track racing. - all right. let's do this. - let's roll. - fires it right up. runs good. - it works. - uh-oh. - the brakes?
- yeah, something's rattling. - [david] uh-oh, something's rattling? (rattling) - what is that? - that's the drive shaftfalling out, is what that is. - that doesn't sound right. - yeah, that's the driveshaft hitting the floor. - whoa, okay, right. right turns are no goodfor the drive shaft.
- yep. - [mike] it smells like aretirement home caught on fire. - oh wow, there's somebody behind us. - i feel better not knowing. - oh, that sounds bad. - oh, first gear. (engine stalls) - okay? - we just ran into the rental car.
- we did, because our car doesn't want to go forward anymore. - i got nothing. we never checked thetraining fluid, did we? - [david] nope. - come on, darling. try and get it over there, i guess. - [david] the spool is not helping. that is going to smoke it fast.
we lost all transmission gear, so either we have no fluid in it, or that little arm, - this thing? - the throttle valve, look down on the transmission at the arm. oh dude, not good. - oh, there's no fluid in there. - poor transmission; ready?
- no traffic? - no, we're good. - good. we're on closed circuit tv. - [mike] hold on, stop it, stop it. - [david] for a federal offense. - [mike] holiday weekend;feds don't work holidays. - and stop. - okay, now let's go get some fluid.
- how far do you thinkwe got? two, three miles? - [david] oh, nah; one. - one? - [david] so the challenger's stranded, and we have a dented cameracar just sitting there, so we jumped in that thing, ran into town, bought some more trainingfluid just so we could limp the challenger back tojamie's and fix the drive shaft. - this is the stenchof victory right here.
- [mike] we're back. must have been that cockyburnout i did at the beginning that really screwed us carmelized. (guitar strums) - [david] that was fun, and brief. at this point, we are way behind schedule. we should have alreadyleft, so we're praying the drive shaft is any easyfix, and we need new tires. - there are these weirdimitation faux drive shaft
safety loops made out of, looks like, three eights all thread,that are basically touching the drive shaft rightnow, so that's the noise. (hammer bangs) well, we yanked the drive shaft out, cause we honestly didn't know how much of the yokewas in the transmission. it seems a little wobbily,so i pulled it out. you can see the shiny part,
that's where it's going on the seal, so we've got at leastthat much engagement, which is good enough for a roadkill. so we're just going toput it back in there, grease the zerk fittings on the u joints, and, god, i hope we hit the road. give me the heaviest, blackestwheel you can give me. - [david] i was worriedthat they were going to be white wagon wheels, so this is a thrill.
(david groans) yes. cooper is, of course, our sponsor, and i love the cooper cobra radial gt. but most importantly, iget to put on the wheels that finnigan hates, and remove the wheels that finnigan loves. doesn't it look much meaner now? - just couldn't stand to have
chevy parts on a crysler, could you? - this thing had thecircle track alignment for turning left, which means it had tons and tons of camber on this side. and so we just sort of eyeballtook that out of there. probably in the completely wrong way, but at least better than it was. (pounding) - [david] nice!
that's bodyworked, way better. oh man, it's like awhole new car; let's go. (david and mike laugh) - [mike] the next day, we hadto make a few more pit stops before we hit the road, andfor some reason it just seemed like this is the townthat will not let us go. - [david] remember when we tooka lowrider out in the desert and we drove, like a quarter mile, and we called it a victory,
and we could still seeour hotel in the distance? - yeah, but that was acasino, and this is a... - that. - median western. - [david] so we got hardware to put all four bolts in eachseat, which will be new. (mike imitates car horn) - we're not at a pump, right? - are you not allowed to pump?
- no; where's the sign? - really? - yeah, we're in oregon; they pump. - we went from the hotelof the auto parts store, then from the auto partsstore to here at a gas station that won't sell us gas,and now we're going from here to a chevron down the street. - [mike] in a car with no seat belts, no windshield, no registration,
no insurance, no title, no shame. - think we are running out of gas. - yeah, we're running out of gas. - okay, we're out of gas. - we can't get out. it's like a horror moviewhen you can't leave town. - it's 10:00; we've beenat this for two hours now. - yeah; and we'll stillhave to now go get gas. - so let's see, we've driven about,
wouldn't you say 15 milesand we ran out of gas? - we haven't gone 15 miles. - i'm keeping it positive. - okay, we filled up the gastank at the side of the road, and we drove 100 yards to the gas station, they filled it up for us. now we're attempting to leave town again. this whole street's oneway, but can we go through? no right turn; we definitely are
not getting out of this town. - we're done. - [mike] no, no, we're good. - [david] we're definitelynot leaving this town. what i want to know is howdid that cop not pull us over? i feel like that's dereliction of duty. i feel a sense of relief; ithink we might have done this. the no windshield thing is overrated. - [mike] want to put a windshield in it?
- [mike] after 100 miles of sucking it up, pretending we're lumberjacksand ignoring the cold and the bugs, we finally gave up and built a proper windshield. do you think it was thecarbon monoxide from the cuda that made us forget what would happen when we blocked off the front windshield and left the back window wide open? - to me, this is way worse.
the exhaust fumes coming into this just... i mean, i feel like i'mhaving a heart attack, and it has only beenlike a mile and a half. we had air flow before; now we just have carbon monoxide, and it's bad. so we're going to have to do something about the open areas hereat the back of the car, so we're taping it up. i figure if you're goingto die, die happy; ready?
- are we out of gas? - we can't go five feetwithout running out of gas, getting lost, or breaking down. - no, we can't. this is going to be a long day. well, at least we won'trun out of gas for a while. - no, we just get to huff it for the next half hour till it evaporates. - i'm feeling giddy;maybe that's what happens
right before death on carbon monoxide? - yeah, you're about to pass out. - [david] do you want totake the windshield back out? - kind of. - i'd like to think i'mgetting better at this, but the truth is, i'm not. - [david] we weredriving down the highway, and all of a sudden, whenhe was getting on and off the throttle, therewas a really bad noise,
that i initially thoughtwas the rear end blowing up, but then it sounded like the tire rubbing. if it has, like, an axle coming out, or something crazy likethat, we need to know. - it might be the rear end; idon't see anything touching. you think they put fluid backin it after they welded it? - that's an awesome question. - the forest grove tractor beamis a little slacked onto us. - [david] yeah, we got to go back.
- [mike] that's going toforce us to go all the way back there to get a new rear end. - i think our only chance is, or really our only choiceis, to just drive on, get to the next town, let it cool off, and attempt to fix it. - pour beer all over it? that would fix me right now. - that's really bad.
(rear end howls) - [david] rear end'showling, and the thing is, we let it cool downback there when we were fiddling with it, and allof a sudden it was fixed. and then we went back out on the road, and did some wide open throttle blasts, because that's what youdo, and it heated up. - that's how you getthe trans in third gear. - it is how you get thetrans in third gear.
unfortunately, the... yeah,that's a whole different thing. - [mike] we've got a howling rear end; that can only mean one thing. slow down and limp all theway to la at 10 miles an hour, or drive fast and have thething explode much sooner. decisions, decisions; so, wejust start babying this thing, driving slower and slower and slower, and stopping every halfhour to let it cool off, because there's no fluid in it.
yeah, we probably should've checked that. ♫ 96 bottles of beer ♫ you take one down, you pass it around ♫ 95 bottles of beer on the wall ♫ 95 bottles of beer ♫ 94 bottles of beer on the wall ♫ - [mike] well, i don'tknow if we've officially lowered our goals yet, but we did a whopping 30 miles an hour for,
oh, 60 or 70 miles yesterday, so in total, i think we did 150 miles yesterday, which sucked, and most of that was because that right there is busted in our car. - the rear end is toast,and it's memorial day, so we figured we weregoing to have no chance to actually go to a shop to get it fixed, so i made a post onfacebook, and all these fans responded to us and were helping out.
we got a crowd here today, one of which brought a new centersection for our challenger. - okay, there's nothing in this. - [mike] there is nothing in this. - that is totally, 100% empty. - [mike] hey, the good news is we're not going to ruin the parking lot. - not even a little. - perfection; that guy knewexactly what we needed,
and brought exactly the right thing. and then left, so that we couldn't even thank him and give him credit on camera. - mopar guys, they'reweird, but resourceful. - well now when somebody says, "how far do you think thisrear end will go with no oil?" like, 156 miles, at 30 miles an hour. "how do you know?" "trust me." (fans shout)
- not quite record speed, but close. (fans laugh) - boom goes the dynamite. - yup. - car started. - [david] sounds good! - [mike] there's a point where you've got to reevaluate your goals. i mean sure, our goal wasto drive this challenger
back to los angeles, butwe've done that lots of times. and, knowing that we're probablynot going to make it anyway, building our own dirt trackin the middle of nowhere and having a race between frieburger and i seemed like a much better idea. - [david] the locals whohelped us out with parts to fix the challenger alsohooked us up with, like, 600 feet of open land here;it's a mud drags course. but we're allowed to do whatever we want.
- monster trucks drive here. - do they? - yeah, so it's perfect for our car. - [mike] so we walked around the field and agreed upon a course; the conditions? unlike anything i've ever encountered. we were racing on grass, witha little bit of dried out mud. how could this not be awesome? this is cool.
mr. frieberger, are you ready? at your leisure. (suspenseful music) - it's just so peaceful here. - come on, number 10. - [david] supposed to come outthe other end, just like it. - whoo-hoo, sliding right into the tree! (engine roars) - [david] it isn't supposedto go way out here,
not again. - [mike] dude, that was rad, i thought you weregoing through the fence. - [david] i did too. - your time completelydepends on how far out in the field you go, i mean icould cut a bunch of time off if i wasn't going as widefor the action down there. - i promise not to cheat you on that. - oh, okay.
- all right, time to beat is120.72 seconds; easy to beat. all right, ready for this? - [david] that's somedistance; what's your plan? - i got strategies. - execute them at your will; ready to go. - [mike] go baby, go! whoo-hoo! oh boy, this is kind of fast. oh here we go, up the hill; whoo-hoo.
concentrate. oh, brakes, brakes, brakes, brakes. pushing, pushing, pushing. come on, traction baby,traction, go go go! whoo-hoo, oh! go, go, go, go! oh, oh boy! - [david] much better. oh, and now it's overheating really bad.
- how'd i do? - [david] 102. - oh, a new track record! - but there's nothing leftof the cooling system. - [mike] oh. doesn't even float the valves;this thing's impressive. - [david] i know, it's fun. let it cool down and go again? - [mike] yeah.
- [mike] the dirt trackchallenger is never going to win a car show, probablynever win a drag race. it's not sexy, it's notfast; but, we had as much fun as you could have giventhe amount of money we put into that thing, andthe smiles are priceless. (majestic music) but best of all, we've still got the car, and you'll see it again on afuture episode of roadkill. want the parts we used to build these cars
visit jegs.com/roadkill hey one more thing don't forget that episodes of roadkill go live on motor trend on demand . com about a month before they get posted to youtube and we have a new show that's only on motor trend on demand that is called roadkill garage so right now check out this teaser for the latest episode on roadkill that is live right now on motor trend on demand this time on roadkill,what you've been asking for
over and over and over, a cummins diesel. and since i knew nothing about that, we had to bring this guy, tony angelo, and when you bring himyou got to bring this guy, lucky costa, and finnegan'ssort of along for the ride. - do they share thesame brain or something? go fast go fast go faster this episode of roadkill is live right now at motor trend on demand .com (thumping)
- [mike] so that's what you call in? - [mike] oh; well then, it's in. - have you seen the show? - i bought that one the night i met her. told her i'd give it toher if she married me. - i don't know who got thebetter end of that deal. - [mike] i have the backof a 41 year old now. i'm not as young as i was whenwe started this (beep) show. (mike sighs)
- i don't think i'veever filled a radiator with a fire hose before;something new every time. - beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep. - beep, beep, beep, beep, beep. - that won't get old at all. - i'm sweating now.