The Drive By is new way to spotlight cars. As the name states these are cars that I see where ever I’m traveling.
The 1966 Barracuda wasn’t much when compared to the 1970’s younger brothers.
1966 Barracuda – old school.
Often referred to as the Formula S – 2 door coupe fastback with the V8. I don’t know if this one was the V8, I would have had to see the if it was badged properly to determine. (Small medallion placed below the ‘Barracuda’ script. The V8 would have been the Commando 273 CID with a two barrel carb – about 235 hp and a 10.5:1 compression when topped with a 4bbl Carter AFB.. The 6 cylinder was the Valaint Signet slant 225 CID with about 145 hp with a single barrel carb. They came in convertible as well – only 2570 of those were produced.
So I’ve gotten the new electrical connection installed on the switch. I now need to cut off the old switch and strip the wires.
Ya know it’s hard to take a video while you a squeezed under a car on jack-stands!!!
In this video you can see the striped wires.
Installing the bracket was easy enough except that it wasn’t formed properly and had to be bent. Keep in mind this is not ‘harden’ steel and too much bending will weaken it and when the reverse lever comes back will just push the bracket backward and not allow the button to be depressed enough to make contact and complete the circuit and turn the backup lights on.
Here it is all installed.
Here it is with the car in the reverse position. You can see the button depressed.
Here is a video shot.
And the intended results:
Now I’d love to tell you that all was well, however remember the bolt and the Sharpie mark I made on it so that I could gauge how far to screw it back in?
Well I was still pretty happy with the progress and I took the car off the jack-stand and started her up and backed out of the garage. That went well, but there didn’t seem to be a first gear once I decided to pull the car forward, nor second gear. She isn’t going to move.
So I’ve got the car out of the garage and right at the edge of the drive on the driver’s side. I have to get under the car and tighten that bold a few more turns. I end up laying partially on the drive way, partially on the rocks (we don’t have grass in your yards here..we have small, gather in you pants when you are laying on them, sharp rocks) and partially on one of your shrubs. Ok, lets not forget the glowing hot Hooker header pipes..yeah…just back out of the garage…no worries the hair on my arm will grow back. Any way, I tighten it just enough to get the car to go into second gear and pull it back into garage.
It had to go back up on the jack-stands for more adjustments, and I had to the switch off once to make adjustments to the bracket. But success was achieved!!!!!
