Challenger Roll Cages & Roll Bars: Enhancing Safety and Stability

Peering into a Challenger equipped with a roll cage or roll bar gives an immediate sense the vehicle is serious business. There are major differences between the two and knowing this difference is the key to a comfortable ride and a track-legal machine.

As you build your Challenger you will need to know the difference between the two to ensure comfort and cabin space are not needlessly sacrificed and that during tech inspection your Challenger will pass.

Roll Cage: There’s a lot more to understand about roll cages than there is to know about roll bars. Roll cages are designed to fasten to the chassis of the car and provide complete protection around the driver. The driver is completely surrounded with protective steel tubing. They also make it possible to install safety harnesses.

Roll Bars: Roll bars are not to be sold short of their safety benefits and cosmetic value. A roll bar does not surround the driver as a roll cage would. These systems simply sit behind the front seats to provide additional bracing and the possibility to add safety harnesses.

Roll cages and roll bars are used in many instances for race vehicles. Everything from drag racing to track racing has rules on the use of roll cages and roll bars. In order to ensure your vehicle is track ready, you will need to know what the rules are for each.

When You Need a Roll Bar: Roll bars are generally required for many track day events and in drag racing. The NHRA states that 6-point roll bars be equipped to vehicles making an 11.49 second pass in the quarter mile.

When You Need a Roll Cage: For serious track use and cars passing through the quarter mile in under 10.99 seconds full roll cages are required. As the speeds and ETAs improve, the number of points needed for the roll cage will rise.

Points: Most of the time you will be required to fit your Challenger with a roll cage with a specific amount of points. When this happens, it is easy to search for a roll cage with the specific point count you need. It is still worth knowing what these points are. Roll cage points are where the cage is welded or bolted to the body.

Roll cages are designed to provide additional protection to the driver. Many will feel a bit of reluctance to install one when they consider the added weight of the system.

The added safety is enough of a reason for most, but it is good to keep in mind that there are performance gains to be had with the use of a full roll cage.

Subframe Connection: Challengers are on a unibody platform, which means there is an absence of a full frame that would otherwise run the length of the vehicle. There are four subframes in the four corners of this car, and they are attached to the floor pans of the vehicle.

This is a weak point in the chassis as it does allow for the chassis to flex. A roll cage will attach to all four subframes and tie them together. Doing this will boost rigidity which will help the vehicle during launching, turning, and acceleration.

Roll cages are a big commitment to make for dual purpose vehicles. If your Challenger is running in the 10-second range you don’t exactly have a choice in whether or not you will need one for regulated racing. You will need to be aware of what this means for street use.

Struggles:  Roll cages and roll bars alike may have a bar that runs behind the rear of the front seats. For the driver and passenger, this may inspire some discomfort as it limits the number of positions the seats could be adjusted to.

In some cases, the rear seats may be left intact but getting to them will be quite the task for rear riding passengers. It’s also worth understanding that many roll cages will completely impede the use of a rear seat.

The biggest pain to many drivers is actually how difficult roll cages make it to get in and out of Challengers. The roll cage may run the length of the rear door sill. The driver and passengers will need to step up and over this section of the roll cage to enter and exit the vehicle.