273 Commando - UTG

I thought the video was inaccurate and biased. But I have to make a comment about the 7.25 rear end reliability.

It’s been nearly 58 years since I bought my ‘65 GoGo in September of 1966. I can’t recall the mileage on it, but it was low, probably less than 7,000 miles. I beat the hell out of that car, racing it at the strip and on the street (mostly.) My first set of tires lasted 6,000 miles - and I didn’t rotate them. The stock Auburn clutch ( a three-spring design, as I recall) didn’t last very long, so I replaced it with a clutch from a local rebuilder that was sort of a “poor man’s Sheifer.”) That clutch was much stiffer, and I beat the pedal so hard, that the pedal assembly cracked the firewall at the mount, forcing me to weld it up. Somewhere I picked up a set of SBP 14” wheels with recapped “cheater slicks” that I used for the strip and selected street events. I read every article I could find on tuning and hopping up the 273. The two most helpful were one on jetting the AFB, and setting up the distributor, which I did on the Sun distributor machine in the very well-equipped auto shop at NW Classen. My final mod was a “dump” pipe I welded in just past the “Y” in the exhaust pipe. Running 104 octane DX Super Boron (Sunoco 260 in other areas) I could break into the high 14’s at the local stip in OKC (I believe it was called Sun Valley.) The standard limited-slip never missed a beat until I sold the car the following summer to help pay for my college tuition. It had a little over 16,000 miles on it, and was on its’ third set of tires. The little 7.25 never failed to leave two dark strips on the asphalt with either slicks or street tires. It was also very quick off the line, which won a lot of races on the street.

As for this guy’s. love for Mustangs and Camaros, I owned a ‘65 Mustang 225hp 289 four-speed a few years after that, as well as a ‘67 Camaro with a very built 350. My Dart out-handled and out-stopped both of them, and I thought it was a better car overall, not to mention having a back seat large enough for recreational purposes. It was also quicker and faster than my Mustang, and I beat a bunch of stock 289’s on the street with my Dart. I was looking for a Formula S Barracuda when I bought my car, and didn’t even know a Dart GoGo existed until I saw mine on a used car lot across the street from my high school. I did know about the 235hp 273, and it was love at first sight when I raised the hood and saw that beautiful motor. The Hurst Competition Plus was icing on the cake, as was the yellow paint, gorgeous black interior, and, just like the Formula S, rally stripes. It even had a small RAC tach mounted on the dash.

Just my two cent’s worth.