Project Clonerunner: Young Guns Build

[1968 Charger B5]

The next day I was ready for paint. Three coats of Dupont Orange. I had runs, lots of overspray, but hey it was only my daily driver and it was a uniform color now, so I was happy.


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[1968 Charger B5]

My Clonerunner and I after its first paintjob in Summer 2006. Orange peel, no clear, but good enough for me at the time. It was a good learning experience for me and of course I thought it was near the end of the project seeing I had my heart set of redoing my Charger.



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[1968 Charger B5]

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[1968 Charger B5]

The engine bay. The fresh 318 from the prior year, headers, 4bbl edelbrock carb/intake. As un-Mopar as it is, the black engine bay was spray painted on purpose, I just always liked it.


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[1968 Charger B5]

Epping 2006 my car and some of the family. It was a great show, except for the ride home...





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[1968 Charger B5]

On the way home that night, I ran into a camaro on the highway, and of course that was not going to stuff me. I nailed the gas pedal and the lilttle 318 screamed as much as it could to bring to around 95 mph. The 8 1/4 with the 276s in the back were stressed out and old, so naturally about 15 mins after doing that, YUP you guessed it. BANG, BOOM! And the roadrunner was limping off the highway.

After getting it towed home, and the tow truck driver hooking my air shocks and destroying them, I was extremely bummed out...

I did not have another rear end for the car and was in panic about what do??!! I remember my father's friend Gary Beineke who lived not to far away, was huge into the 71-71 B-bodies, so I gave hinm a call. Being the nice guy he is he tossed me a new 8 3/4 with 323 suregrip for the runner. NICE!!! They went in that night.

[1968 Charger B5]

I was so exicted about the car being back together and now having the 323s in the 8 3/4 I had to show it off. I proceeded to show the car to Gary and Pam. Upon arrival his face was priceless!

"Ah man, junior...reminds me of my old charger. How would you like to repaint the car for some cash and a lot of hours?"

I looked at Gary and of course having no idea what was in store, said hell yes!

That next week Gary and Pam showed me how to block sand a car properly. After a thorough block sand session the car was given some primer. To this day I never really understood why I was taken upon into there home, other than the fact he is just one of those rare "good guys" out there, reminds me of my father. That aside my Roadrunner was ugly. I was now able to spot all the low and high spots from the prior work. I was in total disgust.

[1968 Charger B5]

Another week went by...at this point I had the nose on and off the car and learned how to align panels. The doors, hood, fenders....all was looking in check. The 71 Roadrunners was always my favorite, but I was stuck with my 74. My idea after the first paint job was to put a 71 RR stripe on the car to change the flavor of the car. Saying this to the masters of the 71 B-bodies, of course peeked their interest. Without hesitation Gary showed me hot to weld, and fabricate parts. First thing was first cutting and trimming the bumper so they would not stick out so far. I cut over and inch of metal out of the rear bumper to tuck it in nicely to the 1/4s and get ride of that ugly trim peice thaqt follows it inside. That trim piece which is so hard to find was replacved with flatstock that is cut, welded, and fitted to the newly shortened bumper.

[1968 Charger B5]

By this time it was the beginning of Summer 2007. I had my B.S. degree from BSC college and planned a year off to finish the car.

The front bumper was given the same treatment as the rear being shortened just over an inch and a half.

As I talked about the project of the next few days with Gary and Pam I realized that I wanted to fully match my car to a 71 Roadrunnner. Everything possible had to exactly match a 71 RR, so therefore I was given some parts from the Beineke's as well as bought a few along the way.

The header panel was cut, and a selected chunk was cut from another 71 header panel to give me that ash tray.

If anyone at this point thinks that Gary/Pam did all the work for me, you are mistaken. Gary sort of playing mentor, would show me how to weld, or cut, then walk away and let me figure it out.

I grabbed the welder and started taching the new trimmed header peice in. Of course I burned a few times, and piled the weld up before getting a good grasp of it, but the experience was awesome.

[1968 Charger B5]

Now when you think of a 71 car, just like a 68 you are quickly reminded of those stylish side markers. Yup I had to have those too!

Rather than cut and weld them in from another car, which is what most of you are thinking I did. I used Gary's press for the 71 side markers. I measured, and cut my holes larger, then used the press to form the metal to accept the setup. The process took me of course a day to accomplish, being junior, haha.

I forgot that the rear of the lights have all that metal attached to the fender, and it got in the way of the front of the new marker light. So destroying my excitement for the day I realized I had to move the front two marker lights back 1/2 an inch to clear that metal. The finished product was looking good. The car really had now started to sport some serious 71 cues.

[1968 Charger B5]

I have seen many 73-74 Roadrunners with dual exhaust and the slotted tips that look great. But the one thing that they lack as oppose to the 71s as usual is great styling. So my rear valance panel was removed and I cut holes, and used a buck to form what would look like factory dual cutouts for the slotted tips I would later run.

[1968 Charger B5]

Now close to half way through the summer, I was ready for more primer. The car was blocked and sprayed with more primer roughly five more times.

It was funny. After the fourth time blocking the car I would ask Gary/Pam to look at the car because I thought it was ready for paint. And as usual Gary would run over the car and circle all the areas he noticed that were low or missed. He would ask me sometime before even looking at it if it was really done, knowing I probbaly missed some areas I worked with the car some more.

[1968 Charger B5]

Early in august the car was finally ready for paint. I had blocked and primered the car down over 9 times. I was so sick of sanding! The car was then set up for paint. A sealer was first used.

[1968 Charger B5]

I the layed down 3 layers of Nason EV2 basecost, followed by fogging the car down to evenly spread the gold metallic.

[1968 Charger B5]

Next 3-4 layers of clear