65 Barracuda daily driver

[65barracudaLA]

Somehow I knew you were gonna leave the tops of the fins and script on the valve covers natural.

I was actually surprised how good they looked all painted up, but the original plan had been to sand the letters and fins down to the aluminum. Still debating whether to sand down the Edelbrock logo on the intake.

 

[65barracudaLA]

Out with the old

In with the new

It's in! Hit a few snags including having the motor mounts on the wrong sides and some other idiotic things, but the hardest part is done.

Spent about 12 hours on Friday disconnecting everything from drive shaft to fuel lines etc and then 12 hours with the help of a friend to pull the slant, installing timing cover, water pump and oil pan, bolting engine to the transmission, dropping both in the car and bolting it down. Not bad for my first ever engine swap (my friend had swapped an engine before, but not since high school)!

Still plenty to do...

I wasn't able to get the park lock cable housing off the slant transmission yet and the V8 A904 was missing that part. Any tips are welcome.

I had gotten new gaskets for the 90 degree oil filter adapter, but the copper washer is to small to go over the bolt?!

Also didn't realize that slant 6 and V8 dipsticks are different, so I need to find a V8 dipstick now?!

I need to find a crankcase breather that fits the 1" knocked out hole in the Mopar Performance Valve covers.

Still to do (mostly as a reminder to myself):

-install intake
-paint + install exhaust manifolds
-install TTi dual exhaust
-hook up transmission (speedo cable, gear shift cable, park lock cable + housing, transmission cooler lines)
-install driveshaft
-radiator + hoses (+thermostat housing), heater hoses
-install distributor + coil
-install oil sender
-install temp sender
-adjust wiring lengths for V8
-rebuilt and install carburetor (taken apart and cleaned already)
-install starter + inspection cover
-fill transmission, engine and radiator with fluids
-hook up battery

Can't wait to fire it up for the first time!

 

[66fyssh]

Yeah man, progress!!

I'm not at all familiar with the cable transmissions so I'm no help there.

For the breather you could use a grommet. I have some grommets for a 1" hole and a 3/4" breather. I also have an Edelbrock breather with a grommet already on I'd be happy to send you if you'd like.

 

[JDMopar]

Great job! I wish I could help on the park cable also, but back in the day, most of the time I disconnected them with bolt cutters because I was adding a linkage shifted 727! Take the big bolt from the 90-degree oil filter adapter to O'Reilly's or Autozone, and look near where they have new oil pan drain plugs. They usually have a pretty good selection of copper washers and hopefully you can find one to fit. If they don't have one, check a NAPA store. They have bins with all kinds of fittings and oddball stuff. Also, I think you have the same type engine hoist that I do....lol. The legs fold up on mine to make it easier to store. Hang in there and get er done!

 

[65barracudaLA]

Yeah man, progress!!

I'm not at all familiar with the cable transmissions so I'm no help there.

For the breather you could use a grommet. I have some grommets for a 1" hole and a 3/4" breather. I also have an Edelbrock breather with a grommet already on I'd be happy to send you if you'd like.
View attachment 1715954006

Thank you so much!

 

[65barracudaLA]

Great job! I wish I could help on the park cable also, but back in the day, most of the time I disconnected them with bolt cutters because I was adding a linkage shifted 727! Take the big bolt from the 90-degree oil filter adapter to O'Reilly's or Autozone, and look near where they have new oil pan drain plugs. They usually have a pretty good selection of copper washers and hopefully you can find one to fit. If they don't have one, check a NAPA store. They have bins with all kinds of fittings and oddball stuff. Also, I think you have the same type engine hoist that I do....lol. The legs fold up on mine to make it easier to store. Hang in there and get er done!

Yeah, I think I should be able to find that copper washer. To look for oil drain plugs and washers is a great idea. By the way, I was able to get the park lock cable out without issues, but I need to get the housing out from the slant 904 to swap it to the V8 904. All bolts are out but it doesn't move a bit - even when tapping it with a hammer. It might just be caked in there. The transmission was already in a pretty bad shape when I bought the car 13 years ago, so it might not have been apart in at least 20 years. I'll have to try again - I'll have to drain the rest of the fluid out and put it on a bench and take another look. I got that hoist from my 80+ year old neighbor for free. It belonged to someone in her family who didn't want it anymore. I had to replace the hydraulic cylinder (about 60 bucks), but it works well! WE had the engine almost in when we realized that we had to take it out again and extend the beam to the 1/2 ton setting. I wasn't 100% sure how much engine and transmission together weigh, but otherwise we could not have gotten the engine in there with the transmission attached. And yes, it's great that the legs fold up, because my tiny 1920's garage doesn't have very much room to spare.

 

[66fyssh]

Are you referring to the tail housing? There is a big, heavy snap ring under a cover. If I remember correctly, the cover has two bolts and it's under where the crossmember mounts. You'll need a heavy duty pair of snap ring pliers to spread it apart and slide off the housing. To install, you just slide the housing on and the snap ring will engage.

 

[65barracudaLA]

Are you referring to the tail housing? There is a big, heavy snap ring under a cover. If I remember correctly, the cover has two bolts and it's under where the crossmember mounts. You'll need a heavy duty pair of snap ring pliers to spread it apart and slide off the housing. To install, you just slide the housing on and the snap ring will engage.

It's this thing:

I was able to remove the cable per the instructions in the FSM, but it doesn't tell you how to remove the housing. It's got 4 or 5 bolts that I removed, but it doesn't budge. It's very much possible that it's just caked in there, but I don't want to risk damaging something with too much force.

 

[66fyssh]

I would post the question under transmission tech. Someone will know.

 

[JDMopar]

@CudaFactHackJob is a transmission guy who knows his stuff. Maybe he can offer advice if he sees this.

 

[65barracudaLA]

I would post the question under transmission tech. Someone will know.

Just did!

 

[65barracudaLA]

I got it out! The old gasket was rock solid though and it felt like it was epoxied in there. One step closer.

 

[65barracudaLA]

Carburetor is rebuilt!

 

[RustyRatRod]

Heck yeah man! Gettin close now!

 

[65barracudaLA]

Made some progress over the weekend. Got the park lock cable assembly back together, installed the mini-starter, the intake, the center link, the thermostat and fuel pump, found the right copper washer for the 90 degree oil filter and installed it. Turns out that a slant 6 904 dipstick is too long and won't fit, which is too bad, because the V8 transmission had a dipstick tube, but no dipstick when I bought it. Found one on ebay though and ordered that. I had also considered modifying the slant 6 transmission cooler lines, but ended up ordering new ones to speed up the progress. Eventually I got to the exhaust manifolds. I wish I had installed them before the engine went in, but I didn't anticipate what a pain it would be to do that after the fact. I had to bring out the hoist again and lift the engine up to get the passenger side manifold bolted in. I dropped it back down only to realize that for the driver side I had to take out the steering column and lift the engine up on that side as well. And then I got really frustrated: I couldn't get the very last bolt under the master cylinder in. Not only is it hard to reach, but as it turns out there was an old heli coil in the bolt hole that made impossible. Once I figured that out, I pulled the heli coil out and went to the parts store to get a new one, but they had to order it.
After that I bought some beer and decided to clean up the garage, which was a total mess, and fiddle with some little things. I was really bummed out by the manifold snafu, because I can't do a lot of other things until they are in for good. Luckily I found all the parts of the Lokar kickdown assembly and started mocking it up. On the Super Six I had to modify it quite a bit, but for the Edelbrock it should all work as intended. Still need to change the throttle cable to make it work.
Anyhow, it was interesting to see what parts were easier to reach on the slant vs the small block. You can tell that the A-bodies were designed to fit the slant 6 and then the small block was designed to fit that engine compartment.

 

[65barracudaLA]

So things are not going smoothly... Which is not great, because it's still technically my daily driver and only car. I helicoiled the exhaust manifold hole in the head and then the bolt broke off in the helicoil... Not sure how that happened. Anyways, after lifting the engine up AGAIN I was able to get it out with a bolt extractor. I got some new studs and and replaced the helicoil and replaced the bolt with a stud there. I also noticed that the driver side manifold not only had repairs done, but also has some hairline cracks at some mounting points, but not through to where the exhaust gasses pass through. So I eventually have to get a better one, but for now I just need to get the car back together and running - fingers crossed that I won't get a massive exhaust leak.

So then after installing the alternator I noticed I still got the wrong water pump pulley. I ordered one off ebay that will hopefully fit now. I will also have to relocate the ECU so the distributor can go in...

Then I finally opened the big TTi box. I wish I had at least gotten out the instructions earlier. Anyways, I started at the back like the instructions called for. Right away I noticed that the turn downs hit the rear valance when trying to use the factory holes. I could either cut off the turn downs or make a bracket to have them hang lower, which is probably going to mess up the rest of the install. Since I eventually want to cut the valance like the Formula S (but on both sides) and add resonators or at least tips that look like them, I should probably cut them.

For the massive muffler hangers it looks like there are no factory holes, so I'll have to drill some and I guess the back seat will have to come out for that.

I also might have to shim the motor mounts and machine the 90 degree oil filter adapter to make it all fit.

It's all a lot more work than I thought it was going to be, but it'll all worth it once I get to cruise around in the Barracuda again.

 

[65barracudaLA]

Not loving installing the TTi exhaust. Everything needs to be modified and I'm not even half way done. Still gotta find different pulley. Still need to modify the transmission dipstick. Still gotta shorten the 90 degree oil filter bolt (to clear the TTi exhaust per their instructions. Might not need to shim the engine though. Also noticed that the driver side exhaust manifold wasn't sitting flush. Saw that while lying under the car. So I ground down the boss on the block with the dremel and got that fixed for the third time. Tailpipes and mufflers are in. I test fitted the down pipes and everything is pretty tight. The instructions also say that you may have to cut 2" off the H-pipe - it's more like 6 inches and I'm a little hesitant to cut these $1,000 pipes... I don't quite understand how you're supposed to put everything together from the back to the front. There is no room to slide the down pipes onto the H-pipe. So once the H-pipe is cut, I have to unbolt the mufflers and tailpipes again?! I'm realizing this is half a rant and the other half is thinking out loud about next steps. And next the step is to cut the pipes... Actually makes sense to cut off 5 inches, because the Dart wheelbase is 5 inches longer.

 

[65barracudaLA]

The TTi instructions said to machine the bolt down to 0.175". What I did is probably not what they meant by that, but the result is pretty much the same. And now I have a nice hexagon shaped paper weight.

 

[JDMopar]

Dude! You are much better at sawing a straight line with a hack saw than I am..lol. I swear I believe I would start it with that pipe still off to make sure the 90-degree adapter doesn't leak before bolting the exhaust up. If you bolt the pipe up and the bolt clears by 2 inches.....I'm sure I'll be able to hear you scream 3000 miles away! Keep plugging away at it..... you're closer than you've ever been!

 

[65barracudaLA]

If you bolt the pipe up and the bolt clears by 2 inches

I bolted the manifold up and then slid the adapter in without the bolt - it wouldn't fit with the full size bolt. Trust me, I didn't want to cut it, but it went better than I thought it would.

 

[65barracudaLA]

I haven't really made much progress. The exhaust is still not completely in. At least I now got the correct o-rings and seals from Torqueflite Pat to hook up park lock cable, shift cable and speedometer cable. The instructions that came with them said to grease them after installing on the cables, but not with a/t fluid. So just regular grease then?!

Anyways, I realized that I'm nowhere near to fire the engine up and since the Barracuda was my daily driver, I needed some wheels until it runs again. So I bought this little '95 Jeep off Craigslist. It's a Mopar (sort of), it's pretty clean inside and out, it runs well and it's got a/c! I really dig it!

Aside from the exhaust, I can't seem to find the right pulleys. Now I have four water pump pulleys and two crank pulleys and they just don't work together. I got two water pump pulleys that line up with the alternator, but they are two big in diameter to work with with the 3 groove (a/c?) pulley.

What you see in the photos below is a set I bought off ebay, but the crank pulley sticks way too far out. The seller said both pulleys came off a 1979 B300 van, but I can't imagine how that is true. With the money I have now spent on used pulleys that don't fit I could have bought a set of brand new billet pulleys...

 

[65barracudaLA]

It's been way too hot (even for California) to be outside and work on the car, so there hasn't been much progress. But: I finally got a crank pulley that aligns with the water pump pulley and the alternator. There's still a minor issue with that little bushing that is in the rear hole of the alternator, but that should be an easy fix. I will still take everything apart again and paint the pulleys, but I'm super happy that this is figured out.

 

[65barracudaLA]

Still haven't made much progress on the Barracuda. In order to get the oil filter adapter in, I had to take the downpipe out and with the oil filter adapter in I now have to take out the torsion bar on the passenger side to get the downpipe back in. Really not much room there... Also had Covid for the first time about a month ago, then went to Mexico for a week and got some Montezuma's revenge, but now I've recovered and I'm eager to get to work on the exhaust again.

Someone local who I already traded some parts with told me about a '65 4-door Valiant in a junk yard nearby. I went and grabbed both fenders and the hood off of it. The weird thing was that the car was freshly painted. They must have used a forklift to move the car, because both fenders are unfortunately dented in on the bottom. Should be an easy fix though. While taking the fenders off I noticed why the car was in the junkyard: There were some fender washers between the K-frame and the frame rails and when I looked closer, I could see that the frame rail on the driver side was bent. It still has a nice Valiant valance (with the turn signals integrated), decklid and 3-on-the-tree manual transmission including the pedals. If you're in California and interested in those parts, it's in the Sun Valley Pick Your Part.

Anyhow, as soon as the car is running I will work on painting the fenders and hood red. And that extra deck lid that I have. Essentially the entire car needs to be painted again, but I'll probably just do it panel by panel.

 

[JDMopar]

Wow....nice score on the body parts!

 

[65barracudaLA]

It's been a while and for various reasons I only got little things done here and there. One problem was that I had the wrong 90 degree oil filter adapter. For the early A-body you need part number 2463661. Here is a photo that shows exactly how they are different (correct one is on the right):

I guess in '67 they made the engine bays bigger and changed the angle. Not sure why, maybe the oil flows better in that angle?!

Anyhow, now I can bolt that on, and finally get all of the the exhaust in. And then it's just relatively straight forward steps to fire up that small block for the first time... Fingers crossed!