Front Clip Swaps

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68HAVOK

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Hey all,

Was wondering if a 67-69 Dart front clip would bolt onto a Duster. I've seen 67-69 Valiant front clips on Dusters. Anyone have some front clip swap pictures they can share, whatever ya got will help! Thanks!
 
First thing that comes to mind is WHY? I mean I like 67-69 Darts, I have a few. And I surely like 70-73 Dusters. But a Dustart?
 
Just was wondering. I've been wanting to put a 68 Valiant Front Clip on a Duster for a while and have only ever seen one picture of one. The Dart part is just a question.
 
Not sure what valiant your talking about using, but Dusters did use Valiant front clips from the factory.
 
Something like this...

6347386-73.jpg
 
Hey all,

Was wondering if a 67-69 Dart front clip would bolt onto a Duster. I've seen 67-69 Valiant front clips on Dusters. Anyone have some front clip swap pictures they can share, whatever ya got will help! Thanks!
Shouldn't be much to it. A few holes will be different but it should bolt up fairly easy. I put a 75 fender on my 68 with just a few mods to the core support bracket part of the fender and a couple of new holes. Of course I filled the marker lamp hole and drilled it for the 68 unit.
 
I installed a '70 duster front clip on a '76 Dart and liked the looks, but I don't have any photos. I changed everything, so there were no fit issues.The fender difference between Dodge and Plymouth is the shape of the front wheel cutout.
 
Duster and Valiant fenders are pretty much the same as far as the exterior sheetmetal goes. The difference is by model year, not by the style of the fender. For example, a '70 Valiant fender and a '70 Duster fender are the same. But a '68 has some differences- marker lights change, some of the mounting holes on the fender supports for the grille, the filler panel for the bumper, headlight buckets, that sort of thing. The bigger the year swing, the more stuff you'll have to swap. If you have a '75 Duster for example, you'll have extra work to do to make the early bumper brackets bolt to the frame because the frame rails will only have one threaded hole (which is in the wrong place) because of the shock bumper brackets used on the later models.

If you swap the entire clip, the operation is bolt on unless you have a car that only has the holes for the shock mount bumpers. From the firewall forward everything can be swapped, that's how they made all the different models. A demon is just a duster with a dart front clip. A scamp is just a dart with a duster front clip.

Here's a '74 Duster with a '67 Dart front clip. '74 is a transition year for the bumpers, most were non-shock mount front bumpers, so the earlier bumper brackets are bolt on. This is from a member over on the /6 forums, here's a link to his thread...
Slant Six Forum, :: View topic - My brother's "new" 74 Duster

IMG_1075sm.jpg

IMG_1072sm.jpg


I installed a '70 duster front clip on a '76 Dart and liked the looks, but I don't have any photos. I changed everything, so there were no fit issues.The fender difference between Dodge and Plymouth is the shape of the front wheel cutout.

Not true. The wheel opening is different, but the fenders are entirely different lengths too. The Dart fenders are longer, and the entire front clip overhangs the front of the radiator support more than the Duster bodywork does. This is my Duster in the middle of my Demon conversion. Duster fenders with the Dart hood mounted. You can see that the hood for the Dart is several inches longer, that's obviously the same with the fenders. Frame rails and radiator supports are the same, but that's it...

IMG_1906_zps8zdadyxi.jpg
 
this was a 71 scamp. they will all swap. E-Z? was for me..

Yup, they will all swap. Like I said, the only issue is if you're trying to swap the earlier bumper onto a car with a shock mounted front bumper, or vice-versa. In which case you'll have to come up with a way to mount the bumper brackets, because the frame rails won't have the captured nuts in the right place.

Aframerails-2 copy 2.jpg


You can see that the earlier rails have two captured nuts for the non-shock brackets, while the later cars have only 1 and it's further back. '74 is weird, from August to about November the cars had shock mount front bumpers and only the one hole. From November until end of production in July they had non-shock mount bumpers, and all 3 mounting locations, 2 for the standard brackets they used and one for the shock mount. There was some kind of production issue with the shock mount bumpers. '75 went back to the 1 mounting bolt style.

This is my '74 Duster, pre and post Demon conversion. Same car, different front clip.

IMG_3627_zpsy3oleyjr.jpg

IMG_2059_zpsgwedlaiu.jpg
 
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I consider the hood as part of the front clip, and everything was a direct bolt-on.
 
I consider the hood as part of the front clip, and everything was a direct bolt-on.

So do I.

My point was only that there are a lot more differences between the Dodge and Plymouth front clips than just the shape of the wheel openings.
 
Thanks so much! Anyone else got any links or pictures of front clip swaps? I dig the ones that were already posted!
 
I've read that whole thread from 72bluNblu, really cool man!
 
'74 is weird, from August to about November the cars had shock mount front bumpers and only the one hole. From November until end of production in July they had non-shock mount bumpers, and all 3 mounting locations, 2 for the standard brackets they used and one for the shock mount. There was some kind of production issue with the shock mount bumpers.

My '74 is a late November build (B21 on the fender tag) and it has shock mounts on the front. :poke: :lol:

Just poking at you, figuring out what the factory did is a little bit like trying to understand women. If you ever get close, they change the rules!! :rolleyes:

Been a while since I looked, but for what it's worth I think you are correct about the number of holes in the frame. I don't think the front holes have nuts welded to the back side on mine, though, so a swap for me has an extra measure of difficulty. If the nuts were there, I would wonder if an accident repair in the cars past put the shock mounts on the car, but without the nuts it seems unlikely.
 
My '74 is a late November build (B21 on the fender tag) and it has shock mounts on the front. :poke: :lol:

Just poking at you, figuring out what the factory did is a little bit like trying to understand women. If you ever get close, they change the rules!! :rolleyes:

Been a while since I looked, but for what it's worth I think you are correct about the number of holes in the frame. I don't think the front holes have nuts welded to the back side on mine, though, so a swap for me has an extra measure of difficulty. If the nuts were there, I would wonder if an accident repair in the cars past put the shock mounts on the car, but without the nuts it seems unlikely.

There's always someone that's gotta be different. :realcrazy: lol.

Now I remember, you've got the November car with the shock mounted bumper. I knew it was sometime around November, there's a few December cars with standard bumpers. But you already knew that. Here's that old thread in case anyone wants to look it up. How many CURRENT owners of real '74 360 Duster 4 speed cars on here?
Thanks for clearing that up, I should have said December on. You're definitely not the only one, there were two different 1974 bumpers, and they aren't interchangeable. The mounting holes to bolt the bumper to the bumper brackets are in a different spot.

My '74 non-shock mount bumper
img_2036-jpg.1714942232

Another '74 bumper. I assume this is for a shock mount, although it's a picture from eBay. It was from a '74 Duster though, and you can see the holes for the brackets are in a different spot.
s-l1600-6-jpg.1714942231

My '74 with a 6/4/74 build date had a standard, non-shock mount bumper on it. It also has all 3 holes in the frame, and all of them have captured nuts. So, it will take either a standard bracket or a shock mount bracket. Pre-74 only had standard bracket mounts. Early-ish '74 only had the captured nut for the shock bumper, and then the rest of '74 had all 3 mounting locations. '75 went back to only the shock mounts. So, moral of the story is that if you have a November '73 or earlier built '74, or a 75 or 76 model year car and you want to switch to an earlier front clip you'll have to work out how to mount the standard bumper brackets, because the captured nuts won't be there on those cars. Looks like some of them didn't even have the holes in the frame, judging from the frame rail picture I already posted above.

Anyway, here's a picture of what I'm talking about.
IMG_1917.jpg
 
With the grace from above, a torch, & a welder anything can be made to work. The old adage, "Beat to fit, paint to match" comes to mind...
 
With the grace from above, a torch, & a welder anything can be made to work. The old adage, "Beat to fit, paint to match" comes to mind...

Oh sure, the lack of the proper mounting holes is a pretty minor issue. But to fix it you'd have to be able to weld, because the frame rail will have to be opened up somewhere and nuts welded inside the rails. The rest of the swap is a bolt on operation, anybody that work a wrench can make it happen. To fix the bumper issue that comes up trying to put the earlier bumper brackets on a '75+ or early '74 car you'd need a welder and enough confidence in you abilities to cut open the frame rails. Not hard, but it's definitely a change in skill level compared to the rest of it. Also worth noting if you're looking for a replacement front frame rail, although if you can do that you can install the bumper bracket mounts.
 
Here's a '74 Duster with a '67 Dart front clip. '74 is a transition year for the bumpers, most were non-shock mount front bumpers, so the earlier bumper brackets are bolt on. This is from a member over on the /6 forums, here's a link to his thread...
Slant Six Forum, :: View topic - My brother's "new" 74 Duster

IMG_1075sm.jpg

IMG_1072sm.jpg






[/QUOTE]

The 67 front clip actually looks pretty cool on the Duster! If I had a 73 up Dart Sport I would consider a 68-69 Dart front end if not a Demon clone... Looks much better than the beak!
 
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