Red Bull 1968 Charger AWD Hemi 6 speed

[Motorcitydak]

Hey guys, Ive been on this site for a little while now and have been putting off making a build thread about my car. I did not want to put it up until I was actually doing something cool with it. My plans are very lofty but anyone can say they are doing something to a car or buying crazy parts for it. Its another thing to actually start the fab work to get something crazy done to a car.

As you can see in the title, I have a 1968 Charger which has been my absolute favorite car for many years. Ive had it for almost 2 years, it will be 2 years this june. I got it in rough shape just like most of you guys did and Ive slowly been bringing it back to more of a rust and damage free state. The plans for it are to be as light as possible, if it does not need to be there to be legal on the road or improve performance then it will not be on the car. Ill have 2 racing seats in the front and the stock bench in the rear so I can still hold 4 people. A very basic stereo with my ipod connected to a small amp and probably 4 speakers. No HVAC, thats what windows are for.

The drivetrain will be a mid mounted 5.7 truck Hemi, aluminum A-833 (79.5lbs!) 4 speed, full floating ford 9 inch rear from Moser, 3.23 gears, tru trac rear diff. This is where it starts to get really interesting, i have a nv 147 transfer case from a 2004 jeep grand cherokee, the front driveshaft, front diff and front CV shafts from a Cadillac STS, front knuckles are from a ZO6 and Ill use rear hubs from a c5/c6 re drilled for 5x4.5. Wheels and tires will be 18x10's with 315/30's on all 4 corners.

because of the really wide front tires and the fact that I will have AWD, Im thinking the front camber will not be as severe as an RWD car. Ill probably run normal road setup here, maybe -1 degree with hopefully decent camber gain. Ive set caster at 7.

The reason Ive put off making my own thread is because up until this past weekend, my car has been really boring. Just another '68 Charger being revived. I did all the standard rust removal stuff, new floor boards, new full quarter panels on both sides, replaced the cowl because of a big hole in it.... I also shaved off the drip rails and put some frame connectors in but still, nothing too interesting. It was a Charger with a various array of odd parts laying around it, fortunately that all changed. I was finally able to start modifying the car to be what I want. I started to fab up the front end which among other things, has to hold the STS front diff. The stock K member would never work for me so I just had to make my own.

Forgive me for being lazy but Im just going to copy and paste my progress from another site Ive got a build thread going on

Ok folks, I have a few days here to get some work done on the car. I want to be able to bolt the LCA's onto something by the end of this weekend. I got started today with a decent start, first order of business was making a stand for my new tubing bender. Ive seen bent stuff for years online and at shows but its still really cool to do it yourself for the first time with your own equipment.

The shot is a little smoky, I think its from just after I welded of may be from when I had my bike running, not sure tho (i guess if i cant remember, maybe the smoke is from something else.....)



I had to ream out the LCA hole on the ZO6 knuckles since the racing lower ball joints are fawkin huge! This is a PITA if you are curious, my drill hates me now, wont even make eye contact. Somethin about really high load and super low RPM id guess



Tossed the front passenger stuff together just to check it out



After that, I slid the front diff and CV's into place. I decided to move the front wheels 2 inches forward from the stock location. I did this for a few reasons; to give me more room under the hood/cowl for the motor, increase WB for high speed stability, to further help me out in getting a 50/50 weight distribution and to get the wheels closer to the front so the front end doesn't seem so damn long

I marked out the new front end WMS distance, its 63.5 or 63.25, i cant really remember which one rite now. Stock was around 59 iirc. I guess I must have been smokin somethin....







Now this little beauty, i've been thinking about this for a long time. Its a way for me to finally weigh the shell of the car. Its a 10 ton pancake cylinder from HF and a 1000psi gauge, total cost is just under $200 and it will weigh up to 2200#. Actually it will give you a reading in PSI which must then be calculated into lbs but it is still quite helpful. I used it on the shell today but Im really not sure I can trust it, if its correct then the entire shell only weighs 600 pounds. Id be very happy with that but I just doubt it





Then I lifted the front diff up into place. I know my methods are very crude using wood but its cheap and it works







and I finally got to make my first real incision on the car! Ive been looking forward to this for quite a while. Up until now, everything I have done has just been fixing this or replacing that back to stock just about. This is my first real and invasive mod to the car that the purist's will totally hate!

I had to cut the front frame rail to allow clearance for the CV boot (how many car builders get to say that?!). Where I ended up cutting is rite where the rear stock K member bolt was so I had to take it out, there is no going back from here!



After that, I spent a few hours getting the front passenger side into place. I was hoping to build more of a K member for the front, but that is just not possible with the front diff in the way. Ill have to make it an H, the good news is that the rear tube will fit rite under the pinion and I can hopefully clear the crank pulley of the motor when ever I get another one of those





Well thats all I have to show off for today, Im headed to bed soon then its back at it again tomorrow/actually later today. Hopefully I can get my H member goin

Ill wrap up what I was able to get done over the past few days. Unfortunately I was not able to get as much accomplished as I wanted to. Ideally, I would have my new crossmember welded into the front of the car with the completed LCA brackets in place so I would be able to bolt the LCA's on and start putting together a game plan for the uppers. Im about 80% there but like I said, just not quite done.

I started getting my H member in place after I positioned the LCA, got to use the bender for the first time which was slightly nerve racking just trying to make sure I had everything right





The under crossmember clearance looks good, rite around 7 inches



Then I got the other side bent up which made me even more nervous than the first bend



Rear tube went into place then a couple ones to tie everything together. I tacked the forward tube into the frame rail then tacked all these pieces together. This shot also shows the LCA brackets tacked into place. You can see that I slotted the mounting holes. I will be using eccentric bolts to allow for some adjustability and alignment changes. That job was rather simple but still a big PITA. I drilled the two 1/2 inch holes 3/4 inch apart and a smaller one in the middle then used a 1/2 inch carbide burr in the drill to connect the two. The slots are 1.25 long allowing for a nice amount of alignment adjustment



After I had those mocked into place, I cut the tack welds holding the forward tube in place and dropped the entire crossmember out of the car to finish everything up. Here is what I ended up with

Drivers side mounts, not quite finished yet. I got the outer brackets in but still need to do the inners and tie the two together



here are the passenger side ones, they are just about done but not quite