1965 Plymouth Barracuda - 318 MAGNUM V8
Gosh! I gotta keep on top of these threads! So got the later 904 rebuilt, installed it w/ 2 jacks & a jack stand, fairly easy actually. Filled it up with ATF+4, worked on installing the B&M Star/Ratchet shifter which wasn't too difficult, the way I went about installing that was I actually had to cut the factory shiftier mount tabs out sadly since the shifter just wouldn't fit with them there... So I grabbed the shifter, positioned it where I wanted, grabbed a long skinny flat blade screw driver, scratched on the trans tunnel through the shifter mounting holes, then dotted the 4 little scratches with a sharpie, and drilled away. The first time was a fail because I didn't realize the shifter wasn't all the way in the park position (as per what the instructions say...) so it was way to close to the dash, re-drilled new holes about 3-4" back, also made sure to check seat movement clearance, and it worked out fine. I barely nicked a weld on the trans tunnel to cross member support, caused a few drill bits to literally explode on that hole... Nevertheless, was able to get 3/4 bolts in, should've installed the shifter before the transmission duh. So there's the 2 factory holes on the trans tunnel close to the firewall for the stock shift cables, pulled those grommets out, tried routing the B&M shift cable there, no go, so I routed it through the 1 hole on the passenger side of the trans tunnel, that worked fairly well, cable's so long I just zip tied it up towards the bell housing in a meticulous fashion, keeping the cable away from exhaust as much as possible, and cut some fuel line, wrapped it around the cable as a heat protector. Never got to installing the cover over the shifter yet, nor the safety neutral switch or reverse lights, think I'm gonna screw the neutral safety, will work on the reverse light switch later on.
Still have yet to knock out the heater valve in the passenger exhaust manifold, not too sure how to approach that other than plasma cut or torch it out, then weld up the 2 small holes, another reason that exhaust manifold isn't painted yet. The 1406 Edelbrock Carb's been running like, eh, lately, go part throttle and it wants to studder, nearly die until it get's past that point of the throttle, rebuilt carb as of 6 months ago, think it could be accelerator pump, maybe needs to be jetted for altitude. Getting a SPECTRE 47608 circular air cleaner soon, only to please the pro flow triangular air cleaner haters... And, I kinda like the look of a circular one better :). Happy to finally have a job again, gonna be working on my first '65 Barracuda, getting the 360 Magnum swap going soon, want to try the FiTech EFI out on that 3rd Magnum Swap.
Had a alternator issue a while ago, wasn't charging like it should be around 14.7V, found out 1/3 of the terminals that connect to the diode bank had broken off it's spot weld in the original alternator that came with this car, had to use that alternator cause the new/rebuilt one had stripped out on the belt tension adjuster, so, found another alternator with a decent pulley bearing, since the used original one was going south quickly, actually froze up from heat and smoked the belt for a good 2-3 minutes, that smelled good. Frankensteined an alternator together, using the new guts from the rebuilt alternator, and BAM! No more 12V at idle, 14.7V like it should be, and as high as 15V around 2K+RPM. Also using an electric voltage regulator designed to look like factory.
So when I started driving it around, the shifts on the trans were way off, didn't have enough line pressure, adjustment wasn't set quite right on the kick down rod, so addressed that the best I could, and it shifted when it was supposed to, but not hard enough.. Tried taking the middle rod off, cutting 1" off and re welding it back together since that pivot on later 904's sits at a different height compared to pre '67 transmissions, Found out that there's actually 2 different arm throw-out lengths on the main kick down bracket, guess it's gotta be a '67-up thing since there was a '67 or '68 - 273 in it initially. Disabled the '66 Barracuda to work on the drivetrain, robbed the kick down setup from it, that solved the problem, shifts pretty darn firm! The throw out on the '66 kick down arm is much longer, before I was battling having the previous kick down rod hit the firewall and still not having the proper amount of 1:1 kick down. On the 3rd Magnum Swap I'll be going with a Lokar kick down cable.
Finally figured out how to time off this pro street harmonic balancer, just mark the degree you want and line it up with 0 on the timing mark on the timing cover. Got the timing dialed in, bout 10-12 degrees advanced with the HEI dizzy, need to throw more at it, gotta move all the plug wires 1 over to position the dizzy differently since the cap is so huge, 1/4 of the screw posts, casting of the plastic, running into the firewall, in other words it's maxed out for how I need to turn it till I move the plug wires over. Ratchet shifter working great! Thing that sucks is, when you throw it in ratchet mode, you can't go backwards, and I'm not sure if there's something to adjust on the shifter to make it do that or not, just can only bump it up, 1, 2, & 3.
Had fun wiring my electric choke up... Bought another cheap 12v switch from autozone, tied that in with the choke, 5 amp fused, connected the battery and kept blowing the fuse.. Checked and checked, everything was right. So I bypassed the fuse, as I connected the battery, the light went on, on the switch, choke started getting hot, choke pulled off which was good, so I flipped the switch off and that's when all hell broke lose. Heard a loud POP, smoke at the switch, smoke at the battery terminal, hurried and disconnected it, cut the switch out and threw it on the ground. Apparently the switch was made so badly, it managed to create a dead short as I turned it off, it had done welded itself inside together, terminals nearly melted out of the plastic, so what did I do next... House light switch :). I also rewired it through a 5 amp fuse, working with no problems at all, lesson here, don't buy cheap A switches, and DON'T run anything that ain't fused.
Painted the radiator with VHT Gloss Black, looks sooooo good. Been driving it for a bit now, not right now due to snow on the ground, and salty roads here in Utah... I can say now, it isn't the same car as before haha. Running a 2-3ft glass pack for exhaust right now, plan on making my own dual 2 - 1/2" H pipe or maybe X pipe exhaust soon. Rear drivers tire's still rubbing bad against the trim because who ever did the body work did a very poor job on the wheel well flare just on that side, it's conformed way too far in, so gonna remove that trim and shave some metal off + bend it up, should take care of the rubbing issue, so much worse with 4 people sitting in it.
Had to drive with my brother in his '65 Valiant with the first Magnum Swap, side by side, in this '65 Barracuda, they both haul A, and are just about the same in power, so fun! Finally installed the Formula S badges, had to drill new vertical holes since they're '67-up S badges, previous had the pins horizontal. Running the same fuel holley low psi fuel pump from summit racing as the same one on the '65 Valiant, workin' great! Running a 5 amp fuse through that no problem as well. Every now and again if I drive long periods of time and then come, let's say the drive thru, it'll clickitty clack real loud for 20-30 seconds, then go fairly quiet, don't have any padding separating it from the frame to dampen the noise, gonna address that eventually.
So yeah! That's what's going on so far with the Barracuda. I post a lot of stuff on FB and Instagram, you'll see my content on 'A Body Mopar' and 'All 64-66 Cuda' FB. my Instagram's gwcuda65. I also spent a good amount of time typing up a DIY Magnum Swap Article on here a few months ago, check it out!
DIY - MAGNUM SWAP!!
Gosh! I gotta keep on top of these threads! So got the later 904 rebuilt, installed it w/ 2 jacks & a jack stand, fairly easy actually. Filled it up with ATF+4, worked on installing the B&M Star/Ratchet shifter which wasn't too difficult, the way I went about installing that was I actually had to cut the factory shiftier mount tabs out sadly since the shifter just wouldn't fit with them there... So I grabbed the shifter, positioned it where I wanted, grabbed a long skinny flat blade screw driver, scratched on the trans tunnel through the shifter mounting holes, then dotted the 4 little scratches with a sharpie, and drilled away. The first time was a fail because I didn't realize the shifter wasn't all the way in the park position (as per what the instructions say...) so it was way to close to the dash, re-drilled new holes about 3-4" back, also made sure to check seat movement clearance, and it worked out fine. I barely nicked a weld on the trans tunnel to cross member support, caused a few drill bits to literally explode on that hole... Nevertheless, was able to get 3/4 bolts in, should've installed the shifter before the transmission duh. So there's the 2 factory holes on the trans tunnel close to the firewall for the stock shift cables, pulled those grommets out, tried routing the B&M shift cable there, no go, so I routed it through the 1 hole on the passenger side of the trans tunnel, that worked fairly well, cable's so long I just zip tied it up towards the bell housing in a meticulous fashion, keeping the cable away from exhaust as much as possible, and cut some fuel line, wrapped it around the cable as a heat protector. Never got to installing the cover over the shifter yet, nor the safety neutral switch or reverse lights, think I'm gonna screw the neutral safety, will work on the reverse light switch later on.
Still have yet to knock out the heater valve in the passenger exhaust manifold, not too sure how to approach that other than plasma cut or torch it out, then weld up the 2 small holes, another reason that exhaust manifold isn't painted yet. The 1406 Edelbrock Carb's been running like, eh, lately, go part throttle and it wants to studder, nearly die until it get's past that point of the throttle, rebuilt carb as of 6 months ago, think it could be accelerator pump, maybe needs to be jetted for altitude. Getting a SPECTRE 47608 circular air cleaner soon, only to please the pro flow triangular air cleaner haters... And, I kinda like the look of a circular one better :). Happy to finally have a job again, gonna be working on my first '65 Barracuda, getting the 360 Magnum swap going soon, want to try the FiTech EFI out on that 3rd Magnum Swap.
Had a alternator issue a while ago, wasn't charging like it should be around 14.7V, found out 1/3 of the terminals that connect to the diode bank had broken off it's spot weld in the original alternator that came with this car, had to use that alternator cause the new/rebuilt one had stripped out on the belt tension adjuster, so, found another alternator with a decent pulley bearing, since the used original one was going south quickly, actually froze up from heat and smoked the belt for a good 2-3 minutes, that smelled good. Frankensteined an alternator together, using the new guts from the rebuilt alternator, and BAM! No more 12V at idle, 14.7V like it should be, and as high as 15V around 2K+RPM. Also using an electric voltage regulator designed to look like factory.
So when I started driving it around, the shifts on the trans were way off, didn't have enough line pressure, adjustment wasn't set quite right on the kick down rod, so addressed that the best I could, and it shifted when it was supposed to, but not hard enough.. Tried taking the middle rod off, cutting 1" off and re welding it back together since that pivot on later 904's sits at a different height compared to pre '67 transmissions, Found out that there's actually 2 different arm throw-out lengths on the main kick down bracket, guess it's gotta be a '67-up thing since there was a '67 or '68 - 273 in it initially. Disabled the '66 Barracuda to work on the drivetrain, robbed the kick down setup from it, that solved the problem, shifts pretty darn firm! The throw out on the '66 kick down arm is much longer, before I was battling having the previous kick down rod hit the firewall and still not having the proper amount of 1:1 kick down. On the 3rd Magnum Swap I'll be going with a Lokar kick down cable.
Finally figured out how to time off this pro street harmonic balancer, just mark the degree you want and line it up with 0 on the timing mark on the timing cover. Got the timing dialed in, bout 10-12 degrees advanced with the HEI dizzy, need to throw more at it, gotta move all the plug wires 1 over to position the dizzy differently since the cap is so huge, 1/4 of the screw posts, casting of the plastic, running into the firewall, in other words it's maxed out for how I need to turn it till I move the plug wires over. Ratchet shifter working great! Thing that sucks is, when you throw it in ratchet mode, you can't go backwards, and I'm not sure if there's something to adjust on the shifter to make it do that or not, just can only bump it up, 1, 2, & 3.
Had fun wiring my electric choke up... Bought another cheap 12v switch from autozone, tied that in with the choke, 5 amp fused, connected the battery and kept blowing the fuse.. Checked and checked, everything was right. So I bypassed the fuse, as I connected the battery, the light went on, on the switch, choke started getting hot, choke pulled off which was good, so I flipped the switch off and that's when all hell broke lose. Heard a loud POP, smoke at the switch, smoke at the battery terminal, hurried and disconnected it, cut the switch out and threw it on the ground. Apparently the switch was made so badly, it managed to create a dead short as I turned it off, it had done welded itself inside together, terminals nearly melted out of the plastic, so what did I do next... House light switch :). I also rewired it through a 5 amp fuse, working with no problems at all, lesson here, don't buy cheap A switches, and DON'T run anything that ain't fused.
Painted the radiator with VHT Gloss Black, looks sooooo good. Been driving it for a bit now, not right now due to snow on the ground, and salty roads here in Utah... I can say now, it isn't the same car as before haha. Running a 2-3ft glass pack for exhaust right now, plan on making my own dual 2 - 1/2" H pipe or maybe X pipe exhaust soon. Rear drivers tire's still rubbing bad against the trim because who ever did the body work did a very poor job on the wheel well flare just on that side, it's conformed way too far in, so gonna remove that trim and shave some metal off + bend it up, should take care of the rubbing issue, so much worse with 4 people sitting in it.
Had to drive with my brother in his '65 Valiant with the first Magnum Swap, side by side, in this '65 Barracuda, they both haul A, and are just about the same in power, so fun! Finally installed the Formula S badges, had to drill new vertical holes since they're '67-up S badges, previous had the pins horizontal. Running the same fuel holley low psi fuel pump from summit racing as the same one on the '65 Valiant, workin' great! Running a 5 amp fuse through that no problem as well. Every now and again if I drive long periods of time and then come, let's say the drive thru, it'll clickitty clack real loud for 20-30 seconds, then go fairly quiet, don't have any padding separating it from the frame to dampen the noise, gonna address that eventually.
So yeah! That's what's going on so far with the Barracuda. I post a lot of stuff on FB and Instagram, you'll see my content on 'A Body Mopar' and 'All 64-66 Cuda' FB. my Instagram's gwcuda65. I also spent a good amount of time typing up a DIY Magnum Swap Article on here a few months ago, check it out!
DIY - MAGNUM SWAP!!
