Charger GTS by: Randy Holden Photos by: John Armisead

Matt Delaney is one of the most imaginative guys in the Mopar hobby. In our January 1999 issue, we featured his amazing fuel injected retro – modern 1970 Hemicuda on our cover. With that car, Matt pushed the limits of modern technology and muscle car good looks to a new height. But, unbeknownst to us, Matt was already planning something to eclipse that machine even before the issue was released.

As Matt’s Hemicuda project was nearing completion, he took a trip to Vegas and rented a Viper while there. According to Matt, the car absolutely ruined him! He came home to Shreveport, LA , and couldn’t shake the desire to own a Viper.

But, there’s something you should know about Matt in case you haven’t already guessed. Matt doesn’t like going along with the crowd. He realized that while he wanted a Viper, he wouldn’t be happy with one because there are too many of them running around. With one of the most creative brains existing, a plan quickly formed.

Years back, Matt bought a “68 Hemi Charger. During the restoration of the Hemi car, he obtained a relatively plain “68 Charger with a stuck 383. While the Hemi car restoration got sidetracked for other projects, the parts car remained at his brother’s farm along with rest of Matt’s ever-growing collection. Having always been a fan of the Coke bottle bodied Chargers, Matt decided to create the world’s first Viper with a B-body skin wrapped around it.

To get the project underway, Matt ordered up a Viper Crate Motor and six speed transmission from Viper Connection in Atlanta. While awaiting the arrival of the powertrain, the Charger went on Matt’s rotisserie for its initial disassemble. Once the engine and tranny arrived, the fun really began.

Matt has remarkable talent for visualizing the finished product, and is doubly blessed with being able to figure out how to make things look exactly right. He chose the Charger body because he liked the body style and because he thought the long hood meant the engine bay would be more friendly to the long Viper V-10.

When the engine was pulled from its plastic crate, Matt realized this wouldn’t be as easy as he had thought. For those of you don’t have one of these things lying around, a V-10 is significantly longer and taller than a big block V-8. The V-10 wouldn’t fit between the radiator core support and the firewall, and what’s more, it became readily apparent the Viper motor wouldn’t sit on the stock K –member without sticking up several inches past the hood. This was not what Matt had in mind.

Matt’s friend Brad Emmons Built a custom stand for the engine and transmission, then the boys ripped the entire chassis out from under the Charger and positioned the body on jack stands over the engine. The firewall was cut out to allow clearance for the engine’s length.

With the Charger literally lowered into place around the engine and transmission, Matt worked with the stands to get the body sitting at just the right height and with just the right stance. Finally, he liked what he saw, and then he and Brad, along with Gary Medders of B&M Performance in Bossier City, studied the situation for a solid month to figure out how to get the Charger to look like what Matt had envisioned.

No street rod company or aftermarket source had a front K-member that would support the V-10 and allow it to sit at the proper height. This was a major obstacle. Finally, the boys decided to use Magnumforce upper and lower control arms for the front suspension, then Brad and Gary welded together a custom made tubular steel K-member that resides in front of the oil pan. To handle steering chores, Matt reworked a power rack & pinion systems from BRT. The rack has 7 inches of travel which allows it to move in front of the oil pan as well.

The firewall was relocated almost 3” aft of its original location and the side facing the engine was smoothed off to leave a clean looking piece that looks deceptively stock. To keep this subtle move even more subtle, the inside of the firewall remains stone stock looking.

Even with relocating the firewall, very little room was left under the hood. To free up a few more inches, the radiator was moved to the outside of the radiator support. This allowed the V-10 to finally rest easily between the front wheels.

The six speed tranny is considerable larger an 833 four speed. The stock floors were cut out donated to a friend’s Charger restoration project. The newly fabricated floors feature a taller and wider transmission tunnel, while keeping the floor and seat mounting heights at stock levels.

For the rear suspension, the Charger went to B&M Performance, where they fabricated a unique ladder-link system hooked to a pair of adjustable Strange coil-over shocks. The frames were rigidly tied together, and the bars which link the suspension could double for something off a panzer tank!

Matt wanted the Charger to handle like a Viper. He knew the secret to this was in making the underbelly rock hard. The car’s rigidity became an obsession. The rear wheel houses were cut away and a set of min tubs installed, then a narrowed 8-3/4” rear was hung with 3.91 gears in an aluminum Mopar Performance chunk.

To finish up with the Charger’s suspension, Wilwood disc brakes now reside at all four corners, worked by a Mopar Performance master cylinder. As for the more than impressive wheels and tries, Matt wanted them to look like the ones on real Viper GTS-R Trans Am cars. He contacted Kinesis and asked if a set of the wheels could be made with the standard 5 on 4.5” Chrysler bolt pattern.

Intrigued by his project, the crew at Kinesis custom made these three piece wheels for the Charger. Out back are a pair of 18x12” rims, and the fronts are 18x8s! The rubber in the back consists of 345/35/18” Michelin Pilot Sports (actually one size bigger than what comes on a Viper) and the front rims hold 245/45/18s. This is some extreme high speed rubber!

Moving indoors, if there is ever a four passenger Viper built, this is probably what its interior will look like. The front seats were made by Scat and were chosen because they very closely resemble factory Viper seats but still sat up high enough to allow for good visibility in the larger car. Automotive Custom Specialties recovered the stock back seat to match the new high tech front buckets, likewise, the console is a custom fabricated unit which copies the console found in Vipers and even features a comfy cup holder! The Pistol Grip Shifter handle is attached to the six speed via a B&M Ripper shifter thanks to the efforts of Gunslinger Performance. The door panels are stock 1970 Charger panels and the headliner is a stock Charge unit as well. The carpet in this one wants to make you drive barefooted! For floor covering, Matt chose Mercedes velour/pile carpeting! The dash is absolutely state-of-the art. The dash face itself is made of composite graphite supplied by Precision Trim of Rhode Island. Silver faced Auto Meter Ultralite gauges stare the driver in the face, while just to the right reside the controls for the Vintage Auto Air A/C system.

An Aiwa CD/MP3 player is tied into 700 watts of amps and pushes sound to Soundstream speakers and subwoofers strategically placed to deliver magnificent concert quality sound. This is not a boom-boom car; Matt’s not into that. The sound system in the Charger delivers sharp and clear tones that must be heard to be appreciated.

Originally a vinyl top car, the Charge’s roof had some serious rust problems, so early in the project the center of roof was cut away and re-skinned with clean sheet metal, And , as with most Mopars, a new trunk floor plan had to installed to rust woes aft. It is in the area of the bodywork, however, that Matt’s attention to detail (dare we say fanaticism) really shines. Everything inside and out of the car, top and bottom, was stripped with a good dipping then paint or rust proofing materials covered every inch of steel. While it was on the rotisserie, hoses were inserted into the car’s frame to coat the inside of the frame rails with paint! To quote Matt, “this one will never rust again.”

All Muscle era Mopars are rattle traps to varying degrees; there’s nothing wrong with them, that’s just how cars were built in the 1960’s. Matt didn’t want rattles. To remedy two common sources of rattles, they drilled out the factory spot welds which held the deck lid and hood skins on their framework, then reattached the skins with solid welds after installing insulating material between the frame and the sheet metal! That’s attention to detail!

Eagle Paint and Body in Shreveport sprayed the Charger overall in Viper silver metallic top and bottom, then installed a set of red 1968 R/T stripes. Amazingly, this one is just a basic base coat/clear paint job, but it looks like the paint is six feet deep!

Then, of course, there were a number of conventional restoration techniques followed. As far as the chrome and trim on this goes, if it’s not NS, it’s neat mint original piece. Knowing he had created something unique once more, Matt chose to call his creation a “Charge GTS”, and the emblem between the taillight lenses generates a lot of comments.

The most amazing fact of all is that the Charger was finished in just one year! While Matt never considers any of his cars truly finished, the Charger made its show debut at the Mopar Nats in Ohio, and promptly won the overall People’s Choice award – no simple feat at the nation’s largest Mopar event with over 3,000 cars attendance!

There are a few more plans in store for the Charger, but as of this writing, Matt’s Charger GTS is seeing some serious street use. The silver modern missile tips the scales at 3,450 pounds and delivers 440 horsepower at the rear wheels (dyno-proven). Yep, it’s blindingly fast. Matt reports the Charger lays into corners like it’s on rails and handles better than a lot of new Corvettes he’s driven. So, once more, Matt has captured the best of all worlds-old school good looks and modern super-car performance and handling.

As magnificent as this piece is, we are assured by Matt that his next project will put this one to shame! What is up to no? He’s not saying but when that one’s finished, rest assured, you’ll see it here first too. In the meantime, a new standard has been set, it’ll be interesting to see if this one starts a whole new trend toward muscle car restifications.