273 Commando intake question

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1974DartSwinger

1974DartSwinger

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Hey everyone! My current set up in the '66 Barracuda is a 1974 360 block/heads with the 273 hipo intake and carter afb. Its the factory 273 commando set up just put on a 360.

I found a pretty good deal on an extra 4bbl 273 hipo intake.

My question is I'm not 100% sure but I thought the 273 intake ports were really tiny compared to the 360. I was thinking about picking up this spare intake and seeing what I could do about port matching it to the 360 heads. Has anyone tried this? I'm not sure how much power is to be had but figured it would be worth a shot. I like keeping things on the sleeper/factory side.

Thanks!
 
The ports are noticably smaller. If it were me, I'd look for a Holley Street Dominator or one of the Offenhauser single planes that look similar to the 273 intake, but are designed with the 340/360 intake ports. Use a 440 AVS carb, You should notice quite a change at that point. Then use a large opening air filter base plate and your original top. Then a little grinding here and there and it would be hard to tell. How many of us know what the original stuff looks like anyway?
 
I'm not sure there's enough "meat" on the original 273 manifold to port it that far, but maybe. If you buy one be sure it's from '66 or later so that it will bolt up to the 360. '65 & earlier manifolds used smaller bolts at a different angle. I know what the original manifolds looked like & you're never going to fool anybody that has much of a clue by using a different manifold. A stock 318 2 barrel manifold is probably more of a high-rise design than the 273 4 barrel manifold. That sucka' is FLAT! The later manifold is still a good idea though.
 
I would not count on fooling you about 273's ... I do agree with you about porting the 273 manifold.
In my free time I'll take a couple of pictures, hopefully this year ;-)
 
Forget this idea, sell the intake to someone who wants it.
 
I was trying to avoid going with an aftermarket intake, I have the 4bbl 273 hipo intake on it now but didn't want to port my original one. I'll have to ask around and see if anyone has ported these 273 intakes before and how much metal is available to attack with the carbide bit. I guess another option would be just using a stock 360 4bbl factory intake, at least then it wouldnt say "edelbrock" on it.
For carbs, I really like my factory carter AFB - its a very easy carb to work on and after I replaced the bad choke pull off it works great. The only bad side for tuning is it has the 3-step metering rods and "tall" jets that go with them. I have a carter strip kit and an edelbrock tuning kit but they're the normal 2-step rods. So far the mixture seems dead on though so no worries. The other main reason I want to keep my AFB is its the original correct carb for this car. Believe it or not its a one year only carb- it came ONLY on '66 273 hipo AUTO barracudas- good luck finding another one. It ain't broke so you know the saying . . .
The goofy special air cleaner that goes along with the 273 intake/carb is also pretty tall. Its that little pie tin with the larger than regular carb base plate. has "273 commando" on top. doesn't leave me much room for something like an air-gap intake.
This car is never going to be a 11 sec machine or anything. She's my almost daily driver in the summer - logged 7,000 miles last year. I prefer cruising and showing to racing for now, you break less parts that way ;) But if a few easy HP would be had with a ported intake then why not.
 
When I originally built my Barracuda, I put the 273 intake on my 360. It was completely ported to match the X heads and had a 600 Holley. It looked cool and went good (13.25). Then I put an LD340 and a 750 Holley on then it went 12.97. The 273 intake looks great, but is not too great for a 360.
 

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67Dart273 said:
Forget this idea, sell the intake to someone who wants it.
Click to expand...
My thoughts exactly !
These intakes aren't exactly growing on trees anymore ; and , in my opinion , they're either restoration pieces for '66 / '67 273's , or are a decent intake for the '67 - '78 318's with the stock heads .

Once you hog & port that intake , it's no good to anyone with a 273 .
Get one of the millions of after market intakes and fool with it instead , or use that iron 360 intake and fiddle with it .

Again , just my opinion :thumblef:
 
Grind off the name on any aftermarket intake and pait it to match the engine.
 
haha I was thinking about doing that actually . . . get an Eddy intake and grind off the name. We'll see what happens.

Commando66- Did the 273 intake have enough metal there to port match to the 340/360 heads? How thick did you end up between the runners? Any photos of the porting or tips for me?

I'm running the stock 360 exhaust manifolds. I may pull them off and port them a bit but not any time soon. I was also thinking about doing a camshaft this year. It's got the factory 360 cam now so maybe a comp 262 or something with new springs and pushrods. I'm still running the factory 7 1/4 rear so that limits my options and I'm not in a rush to change that out. Like I said, she's more of a cruising car / local show car. Not too many '66 Barracudas running around though, even here in Detroit! I sure love her, got new Mancini SS leaf springs and shocks- rides like a dream. Running SB rally rims, have the factory 14in wheel covers but no rims.
Here's my set up currently. Going to swap out the battery for the correct restoration one this year too.
CudaengineLside.jpg

cuda2018.jpg
 
There wasn't a lot of room for the gaskets but it worked. Sorry, no photos it was done in the stone ages(1990). Have you tried the stock hubcaps on the rallyes without the center caps?
 
As promised. The Holley Street Dominator has 273/ 318 small ports so the Offenhauser looks more promising with 340/ 360 heads, although it is a bit taller. You can see the difference in ports between the 273 and Offenhauser intake.

273intakes002.jpg


273intakes001.jpg


273intakes006.jpg
 
Sweet, thanks 66fs for the photos. Thats a nice resource for me :)

Also thanks to bvt69dart. . . I too like the bone stock look, just don't tell anyone that there's really a 360 in there, not the 273 ;) haha
 
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