Members Cars (Archive)

1973 VJ Charger E48
Daniel Kronberger
Last Updated: 25/05/2018

Here are some pictures of my 1973 E48 6 Pack Charger which has been fully restored. I started work on the car way back in 1998 when it was just a bare shell. There was not one piece bolted on the car when I bought it except for the original alloy wheels! The original engine, gearbox, trim, E48 diff etc. were all missing from the car. It was originally painted True Blue Metallic and had parchment interior with sports pack (770/E48) interior and black “hockey stick” stripes. The restoration has been gradually done over the years but more intensely throughout 2005 and was finally licensed and unleashed back on the road in November 2006.

The car was stripped back to bare metal and the minimal rust that did exist was cut out of the car. It has been painted 2 pack Vitamin 'C' orange with R/T E49 stripes and stickers.

I was extremely lucky enough to find a rare original E48 engine for sale in the local paper assembled with original triple 45mm dual throat webers, manifold, twin plate clutch, gearbox etc. The engine was pulled down and fully blueprinted beyond E38/E49 Chrysler factory race preparation guidelines ie.balanced crank, deburred & shotpeened conrods, chamfered oil holes, deburred block, lightened flywheel dowelled to crank etc. It has a polished and ported head running on unleaded, match ported manifold and extractors running through a twin 2" system with upsweep tail pipes as per E49.The engine is fitted with a sold lifter HP Viper race spec camshaft, rollmaster timing chain, baffled sump and 0.040" oversize pistons and roller rockers. The factory alloy rocker cover, inlet manifold, aftermarket alloy side cover and alloy wheels have all been polished.

The twin plate clutch is coupled to a standard 4 speed gearbox running through to a Borg Warner XB GT 3.5:1 ratio diff with disc brakes which replaces the missing heavy duty 3.27 E48 diff. New slotted brake rotors are on the front and all front suspension components are new and the rear springs have been reset. Adjustable shocks all round. Front and rear anti sway bars have been fitted and a 16:1 ratio R/T steering box gets the car handling like a real track car!

The interior has been re-trimmed in black in the original factory style. The original fish scale E48 dash has been restored along with factory sports steering wheel. All air vents have been restored to operate as new and the heater box (to suit a 6 pack) has been retrofitted to have a vent and cable on the passenger side as opposed to the basic door setup.

The VJ E48 Charger was the last of the 70's "supercars" and is an extremely rare vehicle. Some would say that I should have kept the car completely original? However, this how I wanted it to be and I am extremely happy with the end result given the task of rebuilding a complete car from scratch! A huge amount of time, patience, determination, sleepless nights, blood, sweat, tears (and of course beer) was required to get this project done! I would like to thank my fiancée Kathryn for putting up with me during the build and my dad Rob for all of his help and knowledge! Thanks also to Kwinana Performance and Southside Smash.

The car has won a number of awards as follows:

Motorvation 21 2007:

  • Muscle Car Top Judged Winner Overall
  • Muscle Car Best Paint & Body Work
  • Muscle Car Best Interior
  • Muscle Car Best Engine
  • Dyno Shootout 6 Cylinder Naturally Aspirated Winner – 225rwhp

Chrysler Expo 2007:

  • Best Hemi 6 Engine Bay

The car has run a best ET of 14.3 at 100mph on my first outing to the Motorplex. However I am working on some ignition and carby mods at the moment which should take the car up to 250rwhp and with some more tuning and practice, a 13.5 on street tyres should be achievable....

I am happy to chat about the car and can be contacted on my email: kronberger@efp.net.au

Note: Larger pictures can been seen by clicking on the thumbnails