Hi all, I am starting to get ready to begin work on the Duster's body, and an idea that I have been bouncing around in my head keeps coming back up...swapping the front end sheetmetal. I have never been a real fan of the 73+ Duster front end, and changing to the early 70's Swinger front end would make a sort of "pseudo-Demon" that I think would look really nice. Will the panels bolt up? Will the body lines match? I know I would need the hood, both fenders, grill, and front valence and bumper...anything else? Anyone tried this before? As always, thanks in advance.

According to a few people you should be able to do this swap without a large amount of difficulty. You may have to look at the body lines o see if anything changed (I know that there are some line differences and running light differences between the Dart fenders and Plymouth versions). You might also have to do a slight bit of welding if some mounting tabs aren't present. I don't think it'll be too much of a project, this is the same thing that Dodge did to 'copy' the duster to make a Demon. One thing to note is that Dodge during their R&D had some problems getting the front wheel lips to 'jive', and some Demons had a larger 'gap' between the front fender and door (factory tolerences...)

anyhow good luck!

-D.Idiot

I once saw a '73 Duster (big rectangular taillights) with a Demon or Dart nose on her in a magazine. MCG, I believe.

I put the bumper, fenders, grille and hood from a '70 Duster on a '76 Dart. It looked great and was a bolt in. I had to make some minor changes in the bumper mounting, but it wasn't a big deal.

I have noticed that the companies that do fiberglass fenders for Dusters list 70-76 with the same part number...are they all the same? If so, I imagine that I could go to the 70-72 front end with just the hood, grill, valence and bumper...right?