65 Barracuda daily driver

[65barracudaLA]

In my last post I mentioned that the transmission shifts weird and possibly needs a band adjustment, right?

I just came across this photo that I took when I was dealing with that leaky neutral safety switch. You can see that the front band adjustment lock nut is not touching the transmission case, so it's likely completely loose?!

I will tackle that this as soon as possible. So I read that you are supposed to tighten the stud to 72 in lbs (6ft lbs) and then back off 2 or 2 1/2 turns and tighten the lock nut.

'65 manual says 2 turns for 273 V8

 

[66fyssh]

It very well could have come loose. That sounds right by my memory.

 

[65barracudaLA]

So the front band adjuster stud had worked itself out about half way, so there was no adjustment at all. I torqued it to 72 in lbs and turned it back 2 turns and now I've got 2nd gear!!! Had to adjust the kickdown a bit, but now it's shifting great!

Hopefully I'll have some time later today to add some sound deadener to the trunk. It sounds great so far, but it's still a bit boomy.

 

[65barracudaLA]

Finally decided to tackle the leak at the oil filter adapter. Took out the torsion bar and then the passenger side downpipe. Damn, that thing did not want to come out. Eventually it did. Not a lot of oil came out when I took the adapter off. I left the filter on, cleaned everything up and torqued it 40 ft lbs.

No problem getting the torque wrench in there on jack stands. It sure helps having the torsion bar and exhaust out.

Put the exhaust back in, but the new bolt didn't clear. So I took it out again (came out a bit easier this time, but still a pain in the butt). I ended up hammering the exhaust pipe a bit and it cleared nicely (I have no photo of that). Then put the rest back together. That took pretty much all day, but it's done and I'm pretty exhausted (pun intended).

It was too late to test drive and I needed to take a shower. By the way, my gas mileage was pretty bad lately (around 9 mpg) so I ended up putting the stock rods back in the carburetor. It maybe had a little bit more pep, but I've gotten up to 15 mpg before and that's more important to me since I drive the car pretty much every day. It probably helps that the transmission is shifting through all the gears again.

Excited to drive the car tomorrow!

 

[65barracudaLA]

I went to the CPW Club Fall Fling in Van Nuys today. Mine and this '66 next to it were the only early Barracudas at the show and in the swap meet weren't many early A-body parts either.

I bought an orange box ecu that the guy told me worked when he replaced it with MSD or something, but I went and tested it on the car and it doesn't work. It was only ten bucks, though.

I also bought an Edelbrock fuel hard line elbow thing and it doesn't fit. How can it be that you need an adapter to mount an Edelbrock Performer carb on an Edelbrock Performer intake in the first place and then the Edelbrock Performer fuel line doesn't fit between the electric choke and the mechanical choke stove on the intake?! It would probably work with a carb spacer, but I'm currently not interested in removing the carburetor.

Anyways, I changed the springs in the carb to a silver spring, because they didn't move at all when you hit the throttle before. Haven't driven it yet. I'm still trying to improve gas mileage. I picked up 1 mpg by putting more air in the tires. It had been a while since I checked it and they were kinda low.

By the way, the new ebay 90 oil filter adapter was still leaking a bit, but now it's easier to get to it and I tightened it and it seems that leak is fixed.

I really want to start painting the deck lid (and fenders and hood), before I do anything else. Except that I ordered some TTi exhaust tips and once they arrive I will chop off the turn-downs and bolt them on. Anyways, tomorrow I hope to start prepping the deck lid.

 

[junkyardhero]

I went to the CPW Club Fall Fling in Van Nuys today. Mine and this '66 next to it were the only early Barracudas at the show and in the swap meet weren't many early A-body parts either.

ooh! ohh! i saw you!

i was walking the show later in the day and spied your ride, it looks great in person! you were engaged in what looked like deep convo with somebody else so i didn't wanna bug ya.

show looked a little light, the swap was definitely light. i sold a few things, but what a body stuff i did have nobody was buying.

 

[JDMopar]

Glad you got it going again! When you tested the orange ignition box, did you bolt it to the car? I tested a bunch I had in a box that I'd gathered over the years by just plugging them in on my 84 D350 and none of them worked, so I tossed them. Later learned they are supposed to be grounded to the body before they will work! Maybe try that if you haven't tossed it yet. I keep a spare under the seat of everything I own that uses one....lol.

 

[65barracudaLA]

ooh! ohh! i saw you!

i was walking the show later in the day and spied your ride, it looks great in person! you were engaged in what looked like deep convo with somebody else so i didn't wanna bug ya.

show looked a little light, the swap was definitely light. i sold a few things, but what a body stuff i did have nobody was buying.

Thanks! Let's chat at Spring Fling '25 haha!

 

[65barracudaLA]

Glad you got it going again! When you tested the orange ignition box, did you bolt it to the car? I tested a bunch I had in a box that I'd gathered over the years by just plugging them in on my 84 D350 and none of them worked, so I tossed them. Later learned they are supposed to be grounded to the body before they will work! Maybe try that if you haven't tossed it yet. I keep a spare under the seat of everything I own that uses one....lol.

Yeah, I bolted it in and it didn't work. I even scraped the paint of to give it the best chance to ground, but nothing. I swapped the old one back in again and it worked.

 

[65barracudaLA]

I only took that one photo, but someone took a video:



You can also see me in the very first frame of the video haha.

 

[junkyardhero]

Thanks! Let's chat at Spring Fling '25 haha!

count on it!