I'm starting this thread to keep track of my progress on my '68 Dart's tranformation from a more-or-less regular daily driver to a "Pro Beater" machine. We call her Betsy or the Dart.

Some history first,

Modifications/upgrades throughout my ownership of the car have been:


Intake: single Holley 1920 (from 1998 to 2000), then a Weber 32/36 DGEV on a cast iron 2bbl. intake with a modified carb spacer for putting a 2bbl. on a Datsun (2000-2001), finally a Weber 32/36 on a Clifford water heated intake (2002-2005).

Exhaust: Stock exhaust (1998 to 2000), Dutra dual with exhaust heat to manifold and true 2" exhaust with H-pipe rear of the transmission (2001), finally a "chopped heat stove" rear section with the Dutra dual exhast (2002-2005).

Drivetrain: swapped to 8 3/4" rear with 3.55 Auburn suregrip. Small bolt pattern axles. Stock small u-joint size.

Suspension/brakes: 0.920" torsion bars, suspension rebuilt twice, heavy duty 5 leaf rear springs. Edelbrock IAS shocks at all 4 corners.

Front brakes: Stainless Steel Brakes Kelsey-Hayes style 4 piston small bolt pattern brakes.

Rear brakes: 1970s 10x1.75" brakes. All studs on the car now right-hand thread (sometimes I wish I still had left handers on there just to confuse and amaze people...only changed them to make getting lugnuts easier).

Wheels/styling:

Originally (as bought in 1998) 13" steel wheels with no hubcaps. Next came some killer dog dish caps for that ultra '70s chase scene look. Then, for some unknown reason I swapped on the "White Hat Special" "fancy" Dart hubcaps. I guess I was going for the real granny car look. Next, I had some 14"x5.5j steel wheels...wouldn't clear the disc brakes, though, so on went some 14"x7" '70s aluminum slots up front. Next, I ran with 14x7" American Racing outlaws on the rear and the said no-name '70s aluminum slots up front. Then I gave those slots to a nice mechanic I knew who was into Darts...to make way for a matching American Racing Outlaw wheels all round (and a full spare).

Also replaced damaged hood trim and tail light lenses with swap meet items, and installed 3 point harnesses.


SO, barring some other minor changes/maintenance, that brings us up to speed.

Here's an old picture of what the car looked like with the fancy Dart hubcaps on 13" wheels (also with stock springs, 9" brakes, etc.):




and a Clifford WH manifold/Dutra Dual shot:




Future plans to come...

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'68 Dodge Dart 4dr Sedan

Great car and nice writeup, Patrick. Keep up the good Slanted work!

Lou

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Home of Slant6-powered fun machines since 1988

Nice Dart Patrick!
I wait for your Future Plans!!!

Your car makes me nostaligic for my 69 HT . It came that colour. It is now my A body parts bin....resting in a place of honour in the orchard.

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Yeah....Im the one who destroyed this rare, vintage automobile.....

One thing that I've been wanting to do for a while is to get some real gauges in the car. So, last summer I bought an aluminum gauge cluster from www.rockymountaindashes.com . I bought VDO gauges (except for the Autometer fuel gauge) to go in it from egauges.com . The speedometer is electronic and I have an electronic sender for the transmission. Today I took out the old cluster again so I can get started on this part of the project:



You can see the new cluster above and the old one below. I still need to buy some suitable switches for the headlights and emergency flasher switch, and I am going to drill a new hole in this cluster to mount a wiper switch. Here is a closer, but not too good, picutre of the new cluster:



I will be painting the aluminum flat black to look more like the original cluster. I tried to choose gauges that would retain more of a '60s look...no EL backlighting for me, either.

I also pulled all the remaining trim off the car this week. Here are pictures showing a sideview and the front end:







(bonus points for anybody who can guess what kind of wheels those are resting under the car--hint, they're not for a Mopar)

For a grill I am thinking about trying to fabricate something out of steel (or maybe stainless) tubing. I think if I copy the original grill, it shouldn't be too hard.

Finally, I want to fuel inject and turbocharge this car, using a mostly stock motor. I have plans for a turbo manifold that I will post about soon. You can see a picture of a Ford 4.6 V8 throttle body resting on my Clifford manifold...I think this is how I will position the TB to hook up to the turbo piping. As you can see below, the engine bay needs a lot of cleaning, etc.



Motor should be coming out soon:



That's all for now.

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'68 Dodge Dart 4dr Sedan