359 dodge truck build

You have a short in your gauges wire. It appears to be shorting out somewhere from the gauge to the sender.

From memory, those gauges will read empty if you take the sender wire off. (doing so will prove, or disprove this)
If so, run a wire from a known good earth to the sender terminal (at tank, or gauge, whichever is more convenient) and it should go full scale.
If you have reason to doubt the tank earth, just give it one and see if that cures things. I put it under one screw of the sender at the tank end and run the other to the cab, somewhere.
If the above fails to help, you will need to test the gauge, the regulator on the back of the cluster and the sender. You may also have the type of sender that, instead of having a wiper arm on a wound resistance, has a contact and bimetal like inside of the regulator. The contact may be welding, or it needs rewinding (easier to replace?) I have seen the gauges short out internally if it's the hot wire type. A 200 ohm wire-wound potentiometer (think I got mine from Jaycar, maybe it was Dick Smith?) is great for testing the gauge - you wire it in instead of the sender and you can adjust it to any point to see if the gauge will stay in one spot.

Hopefully some of this is of assistance.

Jarrod.

As to a repower, I believe parts are actually fairly readily available for those engines and there are plenty of them about.
For economy, lots of people used to put Perkins 6-354 (and its later variants) into everything. They still seem to be about the place, but you would have some engineering to do.

Jarrod.

Seen rallies in Victoria of Dodge Car Club - probably Australia wide.
Large membership with ads seen on FB.
Great to hear those old donks singing sweetly.
Good first contact if parts source needed. Good luck, Paul.

I would think those old side valves are still pretty common
They were used in everthing and as already mentioned parts are pretty easy to come across

I think it would be far easier to rebuild or change the motor for a good one rather than change the motor for something completely different

If it was mine and I was gunna change it I would be putting the 6354 Perkins in

If it was anyone else I think 5.9 Cummins is most likely the go these days

Paul

If parts are easy to track down I would much rather keep the original engine as it’s a bit different and does everything it needs to do. It does need a rebuild as it leaks and burns oil as fast as she burns fuel. Thank you very much for the input. As for the gauge I will definitely try that, I had a few loads to do today so I refuelled her and it’s showing full but it was doing that last week too when it was only half. I will burn a bit of fuel tomorrow and then do some test. I just won’t chuck out the timber dip stick yet ha ha.

Loves a green waste load

Just keep in mind those old Dodge flat sixes are not cheap to overhaul - although parts are readily available. My last full overhaul to new specs about 3 years ago cost $6.000. Wonderful reliable and quiet motors but if you were not precious about originality you could put in a good running double the horsepower Ford Barra or Commodore V6 engine with a nice modern overdrive box (either manual or auto) for that sort of money.

If you wanted to stay original a set of rings and a valve grind might be all you need

Lang

I was thinking a cross flow falcon 6 with a top loader gear box but getting another mod plate might be a pain in the ass.

Why go back to ancient technology with limited power when the engine of choice for many modern conversions is the next generation Barra. Lots of choices from simple to turbo versions with huge power. Quite a number of gearboxes to choose from as well.

Lang