Mopar Muscle – October 2019

WORTH THE WAIT

them plated with a copper/bronze finish.

While they were designing and installing

the rollcage, the fabricators also sectioned

down the floorpan’s X-bracing, which low-

ered the front seats and gave an impres-

sive 4 inches of increased headroom.

The next area the shop looked at was

the Charger’s suspension. “We carefully

analyzed the tire-wear patterns and put

the car on an alignment machine,” Braun

explains. “The camber readings were 1¾

degrees negative in the front and 1½

degrees negative in the rear, which is great

for racing, but not so good for tire wear.”

To give a much-better-than-stock range

of alignment adjustment and improve over-

all handling, Braun recommended replac-

ing some of the original chassis compo-

nents while retaining the factory three-way-

adjustable Bilstein active suspension. At

both ends, the Brauns Motorsports techs

installed Hotchkis sway bars with heim-

jointed Speedlogix adjustable links. In the

front, they also replaced the stock upper

control arms with Speedlogix adjustable

T6061 billet-aluminum arms. Besides tight-

ening up the steering feel and wheel geom-

etry at higher loads by replacing the rela-

tively soft factory bushings with firmer ones

(and saving 1.25 pounds of weight per

arm), these have a tab-adjustment system

that offers a greater range of settings than

the factory arms, allowing for the reduc-

tion or even elimination of negative camber,

if desired.

To substantially reduce compliance

inherent in the factory setup, eliminate

mass, and reduce wheelhop during hard

launches, Brauns Motorsports replaced

several rear-suspension components with

new parts sourced from Modern Muscle

Xtreme. New billet upper and lower con-

trol arms, as well as new camber rods and

toe rods made from heavy-duty DOM steel

tubing, TIG-welded chromoly tube adapt-

ers with a heavy-duty center adjuster, and

zinc-plated, heat-treated chromoly, and

Teflon-lined rod ends took the place of

the car’s original factory parts.

Ryan adores the added performance

all of the engine, brake system, and chas-

sis upgrades have delivered and thoroughly

enjoys driving his modern muscle car every

day. Looking ahead, he’s going to have

Brauns Motorsports install five-point front

seatbelts and will then test the car’s limits

on the road course at Willow Springs Inter-

national Raceway in Southern California.

72 moparmuscle.com