I owned my 1968 Barracuda for less than a year, and it was somewhat by chance that I bought it, but it also led to me briefly owning a Volvo 122 which I received in part-trade.
The car in the photo below isn’t my Barracuda, but a very similar one, albeit in somewhat nicer shape. As with several cars earlier in my life, I don’t have any photos, so all images in this article were sourced online.
It is, however, the same color, and also in the same wheelcover-free state that mine was when I found it. I still owned my Celica, subject of my last Cars of a Lifetime, and driving through Capitola, California I saw a ’68 Plymouth Barracuda fastback with a for sale sign in the parking lot of an auto parts store. The asking price was $400.00, which even at the time seemed an astoundingly good price. As I was looking it over in the lot, the parts store employee who was selling it came out and asked if I was interested. He told me he was eager to sell as he needed cash to make some upcoming bills. The car looked good other than a dented and poorly repaired fender on the driver’s side – the car was a light yellow (checking a color chart, I believe it was Sunfire Yellow), and had a dented fender that had been partially fixed with body filler and primer, carelessly topped with yellow spray paint that wasn’t really a match for the rest of the car.
The 68 Falcon I had owned not long before made me favorably inclined toward V8 American compacts, and it struck me that the Barracuda would make an interesting project, and should that not pan out, I thought I could potentially flip it for more than the purchase price. The seller and I made arrangements to meet after he got off of work. After a test drive and a careful inspection, I agreed to buy it that evening. I was out of school, working full time, and had a bit of disposable income, and between the cash in my wallet and my daily ATM limit, I was able to come up with the asking price that day. He had brought the paperwork with him and, unusually for a car in this price range, the title was in his name and the tags were current.
It was a nice-looking car, stylish, and other than the dented fender, in pretty good shape, and there wasn’t any evidence of rust. The interior was clean and well-preserved and being a Barracuda fastback, it had a carpeted hatch that folded back into the trunk and a back seat that folded forward, giving an immense cargo area in the back – although getting anything in or out of the back required that they go through the trunk or either of the front doors. While generally less practical than the hatchback on my Celica, the Barracuda’s cargo area did have one distinct advantage over my Toyota in that I could leave items locked in the trunk in relative safety.
Writing this now, I realize my Celica and Barracuda, though very different cars, were both instances of a manufacturer taking economy car underpinnings and upgrading them with a sporty body and a stylish interior.
I’ll also take a moment to clarify a few terms. Mopar is the name for the parts division of the Chrysler Corporation and came to be used as a generic term for Chrysler Corporation products. My Barracuda was based on the A-body platform, which was also used on the Valiant, Dart, Duster, and a number of other submodels.
My 1968 was a second-generation Barracuda. The first-generation 1964-66 model shared much of the bodywork with the compact Plymouth Valiant upon which it was based, and was essentially a fastback Valiant. In 1967, the second-generation body style was introduced, and although based on Valiant/A-body mechanicals, it had its own unique sheetmetal, and was sold in convertible and hardtop versions in addition to the fastback.
It was equipped with the base V8 offered that year – a 318, with a 2-barrel carb and single exhaust. Hotter 340 and 383 V8s were also available, as well as the durable and thrifty slant-6, but despite being the base V8, the 318 moved the car fairly quickly. It turned and stopped, however, about like the Valiant it was based on.
At the time I was living in Santa Cruz and commuting for work to Scotts Valley. This involved a drive over Highway 17, a curving highway that wound through the Santa Cruz Mountains, which tended to point out any chassis shortcomings in a car. Handling on my Barracuda was OK but not great, and replacing the worn, cheap tires that were on it with a better set of radials improved the road manners somewhat.
The brakes, however, were a definite issue for me. They had seemed fine on my test drive and were OK around town or on relaxed freeway drives, but I found them a bit overmatched on my work commute. The 68 Falcon I’d sold earlier had come with the rare option of factory discs, and it had stopped with far more confidence and had perhaps set my expectations a bit high. In hindsight, the Barracuda’s brakes were probably no worse than many other 1960s American cars but to me at the time, it felt like the accelerator pedal could write checks that the brake pedal couldn’t cash.
A-body drum brakes
I investigated options for upgrading the brakes by thumbing through various Peterson books and having a few conversations at various parts counters — this was back when most part stores were independent and parts guys generally had some automotive knowledge. From these, I gained the mistaken impression that swapping in the commonly available spindles and disc brakes off of a ’73 or later A-body or midsize Mopar wasn’t an option for my car, the issue being that the wheels on my ’68 had a smaller bolt pattern that wouldn’t work with the later discs. While small-bolt-pattern disc brakes had been installed on a minuscule number of earlier A-bodies, I was told that finding the parts for these was an almost impossible quest.
This was one of the many times in my life where I wish I knew then what I know now, as looking back, the obvious solution would have been to do the later-model disc brake swap and run large bolt pattern wheels from a later car on the front. Seeing this done on another car years later was a moment of epiphany for me. I believe I could have even switched to a large bolt pattern on all 4 wheels by swapping in the rear axles from a later A-body to avoid mismatched front and rear wheels (If I’m wrong on any of this, I assume someone will correct me in the comments). At the time, though, it seemed as if I was stuck with the factory drum brakes, which were marginal at best and didn’t inspire confidence when taxed.
This also points out how much easier it is to find information these days than in the pre-internet era. At the time, my Mopar-specific mechanical knowledge pretty much started and ended with an awareness that the driver’s side lug nuts were reverse threaded. While there was a fairly straightforward way to upgrade the brakes, I didn’t know anyone who knew the answer, shop manuals were limited to repairing the car as it came from the factory, and most of the “tech” articles in car magazines of the time focused on installing parts advertised in their pages, generally for Chevrolet or Fords.
And touching on reverse-threaded lug nuts, I once mentioned this bit of info to a tire shop employee who seemed quite surprised to learn it. He was, at the time, about to undo the lug nuts on a friend’s ’65 Dart with an impact wrench so thankfully I pointed it out before he sheared off the wheel studs.
The “L” on these wheel studs means “Lefty Tighty”
I also came to realize that the body damage was a bit more involved than I had thought. When I bought the car, I could see it had a dented fender and a bent front header panel (the header panel is the sheetmetal panel between the hood and the front grilles). I had assumed I could chase down a junkyard fender, maybe do a little Bondo and primer work, and get the car looking fairly straight. Upon a closer examination, it was evident that the fender edge had been pushed into the driver’s door due to an accident, and then been pried outward out to allow the driver’s door to open.
The inner fender apron was also visibly bent, so bolting on a new fender wouldn’t likely fix things as the mounting points for the fender had been pushed back toward the door. It seemed like getting the car straight would require some professional, and expensive, bodywork – or at least work beyond my skills at the time. It did, thankfully, drive straight and had no apparent alignment issues, so for the time at least, I resigned myself to drive it as it was.
It turned out my Barracuda needed more than just a new fender
I drove the car for a while but my intended project had reached a stalemate. Both of the issues with the car that I thought I could tackle myself looked to be more problematic. My Celica remained my daily driver and commute car, and the Barracuda fell into a weekend and occasional driver. Although the Barracuda was running and driving, and actually drove pretty well, it always felt a bit like an uncompleted project.
Other than replacing the tires as mentioned earlier and repairing an exhaust leak, I didn’t do much work on the car while I owned it. It was missing hubcaps when I bought it, and I picked up a set of cheap baby moons at an auto parts store. Had I been able to easily find a set of dog dish hubcaps, I probably would have gone for those.
One strong memory I have of my Barracuda was when it was warm and the car had been sitting out, there was a distinct and not unpleasant smell that old Mopars often have and that I’ve since recognized in several other old Chrysler Corporation cars of the same vintage.
Given the locking trunk, I used my Barracuda to transport musical equipment, and someone I knew from playing music asked if I’d be interested in selling it. He made me an offer for close to what I had into it, which was still only a few hundred dollars. After some thought, I agreed to sell it to him. He had been driving a very beat Volvo 122, which he offered in part trade. I wasn’t really interested in his Volvo, but he kept adjusting his offer until he reached the point where he’d let it go for $100.00 off of the price of the Barracuda. I didn’t need another car but figured I could flip the Volvo fairly easily and make back the $100 and then some. We exchanged cars, signed the paperwork and I now owned a Volvo.
Not my Volvo 122, but one in far better shape.
I had given his Volvo a quick looking over, but knowing that he drove it regularly, and assuming I’d quickly sell it, I didn’t really check it over that closely. After driving it, and seeing the shape it was in, it became clear that the Barracuda, just by dint of being a running, drivable car with no major issues and current tags (which stay with the car in California), was a substantial upgrade for my friend.
The Volvo badly needed front-end work, and may have had some damage to the front suspension, making it pretty squirrely at speeds above 45 MPH. Though there was a working key for the doors, the ignition cylinder was missing and a twist of a screwdriver was needed to start it. It was a light yellow-green color (similar to the car in the photo above, though in far worse shape) but the trunk lid had been replaced with a black one. It would slowly lose brake fluid and the brake lights didn’t work.
My friend had advised me that if it had been sitting for a while, I’d need to check the brake fluid and pump the brakes until they felt firm, though I’m not sure he was aware of the nonfunctioning brake lights. Both of the brake issues were due to a faulty brake light switch – which on this car was hydraulically actuated and threaded into the brake junction block. Replacing this switch and then bleeding the brakes was the first, and pretty much the only, repair I made on the car. While I topped up various other fluids, I don’t recall ever even bothering to change the oil on it.
The problematic brake switch on my Volvo
The tags on the Volvo were several years out of date, and the paperwork was a signed off pink slip from a previous owner with several bills of sale creating a paper trail from them to my friend to me. While it sounds sketchy, in years past I’ve registered several vehicles by presenting a similar stack of paperwork to the DMV. The main problem is that you’re on the hook for all past-due registration and any parking tickets accrued – which can be substantial. I decided not to re-register the car, as I intended to sell it soon and planned to just pass on the stack of paperwork to the next owner.
My house had a large off-street parking lot at the time, so keeping an old car with expired tags wasn’t much of a problem for me. The lack of tags and general rough shape of the car meant I didn’t drive it much, and to be honest, I can’t recall the year of manufacture.
I probably owned the Volvo for less than two months before I traded it for a metallic blue Hondo II electric bass guitar, adding another bill of sale to the Volvo’s growing stack of paperwork. Hondo II was a line of lower-priced electric instruments sold in the 70s and 80s, generally patterned after more expensive guitars. Musical instruments, like cars and motorcycles, frequently came in and out of my life at the time, and I don’t recall what happened to this bass, but it passed out of my ownership not much later.
Comparing relative historic prices is always tricky, but if we translate late 1980s dollars into 2021 dollars, a $400 Barracuda would be about $972 in today’s money and a $100.00 Volvo would be about $243. Even taking into account the condition of both cars (especially the Volvo), I think it’s safe to say that each would be worth somewhat more than that today. Back then, though, they were just older, if somewhat interesting, used cars.
If we give the Hondo II bass I ended up with an initial value of $100 (given that it was swapped for the $100 Volvo) which would translate to about $243 in today’s dollars. A quick search of eBay shows similar instruments selling in the mid-$200 dollar range, so of all the items in this series of trades, only the bass guitar is worth the same now as what it was then.
I never quite understood the bartering thing, although I did it once about 10 years ago when someone on Craigslist had a near top-of-the-line Miele dishwasher I wanted that he would only trade, not sell, so I offered up a 24″ or so flat-screen TV or computer monitor worth about $350 at the time; the dishwasher new would cost upwards of $1500. I like its design because both main racks are cleverly designed so they’ll hold anything from dinner plates to glasses rather than the usual rectangular cluster of pegs that accept one but not the other. The upper rack holds larger, heavier items so you don’t have to strain your back to reach down to the low rack; I appreciate good design be it in cars, appliances, or anything else. There’s also a third rack for smaller items. And you can barely hear it running.
I can’t imagine trades that involved a car though, at least for my daily driver. Maybe for collectables that would be fun to own for awhile before I tire of it and want something else of roughly the same value.
I’ve traded a few vehicles over the years, a 79 Mustang Pace Car traded for a 79 BMW 733, which in turn was traded for a 77 Lincoln MkV. And a 53 Chrysler, traded for a 65 Buick, which in turn was traded (with $1000) for a 69 GTO. In hindsight that last trade was a very good deal.
Hey, we have that exact dishwasher. Came with the house and works amazingly well both to fit awkward items and get them clean. Zero problems unlike our Miele washing machine.
I laughed at your recall of the “Mopar smell”. Each of the Big 3 had a unique odor after sitting with windows closed on a hot, sunny day. I suppose that is the case with about every car, with each manufacturer using its own unique mix of plastics and such for interior pieces. I did inhale quite a lot of that Mopar smell back in the 80s and even the 90s.
I remember those hydraulic brake light switches. The one on my 59 Plymouth was troublesome, with a tendency to gunk-up so that the brake lights stayed on all the time. I periodically had to remove it, spray it out with brake cleaner, and put it back. And you bring back life pre-internet, when good information was a lot harder to come by.
I did buy a new VW in 2007 when they were running a promo where you got a free First Act electric guitar with your car, color-matched to your car’s paint. I still have it; actually not bad for a cheap guitar. Rosewood fretboard, and a built-in amp with switchable distortion that runs off a 9V battery, so you can play it through the car’s audio system. The point of the free-guitar promotion was to point out the new-for-2007 aux-in jack so you could plug in your iPod or phone. I like to joke I paid $18,000 for that guitar, but it came with a free car…
Curiously, a few years later VW used Fender-branded audio systems for a while, but never gave away any Fender guitars.
Interesting, three posts with Barracuda’s in the last week or so. My first car was a 122S followed by a Chevy Vega GT, so ownership of an Amazon and an American fastback isn’t that unusual. There are still a handful of 122’s in Santa Cruz and I just saw one yesterday, but not that color; there was one for sale a few years back for about 25 or 30 $100 bills.
I replaced the hydraulic brake light switch on my ’66 F100 with a simple button switch that I attached to my steering column, with the button touching the arm of the brake pedal. Very simple and reliable, and I didn’t have to bleed my brakes. 🙂
Amen to that. I have always regarded hydraulic stop light switches as just plain the wrong way to do it.
Just to make it 4 Barracudas in a week, I will add the one I ordered new for my mother in 1965, she drove it until the day she could not find her way home, it was then sold to a friend in the Slant 6 Club of America. The engine block is still in it’s original form though it has been dressed up a little while I still had it as well as adding an 8 3/4 rear end with 10″ brakes, front disc brakes and Power Steering.
It is still in ‘Show’ condition and appears at several Southern Arizona car shows displayed by it’s new owners.
That is a very apt description of A-bodies with the base-equipment 9-inch drums. The 10-inch drums you had on your V8 car were quite a lot better, and still inadequate.
Whaat? False! Those discs were optional, true, but they were installed on plenty of ’66-’72 A-bodies. In the 1980s and even into the early ’90s, these small-bolt A-body disc brake parts were readily available as used parts in wrecking yards and as new parts over the counter.
Correction noted on the disc brakes! Another misconception that I picked up back then. Thankfully by the time I owned my next 60s Mopar, I had a few friends who were familiar with working on them.
I bought a 1969 Dodge Super Bee that I found sitting in a corn field in Michigan in 1980 for $550. It had the original 383 magnum 4bbl and Hurst shifted A-833 4speed with the ram air long air cleaner and the twin low profile hood scoops. Cobalt blue with a black vinyl roof and black bumblebee stripes around the rear end. The passenger side front fender had been replaced with a yellow one(same color as your Barracuda) from a Coronet. A little rust behind the rear wheels and some “guardrail kisses” at the corners of the body were the only flaws on an otherwise all original Mopar muscle car with a legendary history. It was originally from Kentucky and allegedly had been used to run moonshine. This seemed confirmed when I found the backseat was loose and the tar undercoating underneath had imprints of many rows of Mason jars in it. It also had been ordered with the Hemi drivetrain and suspension, but then deleted the 426 and specified the “super commando” 383. This was allegedly to make it unlikely to break a motor mount or u-joint when outrunning the law with ‘only’ 480 ft-lbs of torque applied at the flywheel instead of the Hemi.
Being a ‘strictly business’ muscle car, it was not burdened with any luxury features like A/C, power steering, power brakes, or even bucket seats! It had 11 inch drum brakes all around(due to the hemi package) and they were AWFUL. Same with the manual steering; huge steering wheel like a truck, about 10 turns of the wheel lock-to-lock, frightening body lean, and very high effort when parallel parking. Combined with a VERY stiff clutch pedal and the long throw pistol grip Hurst, driving was a very hands on affair. No cruising with your arm around your girlfriend’s shoulders, even though the bench seat made it possible. Second and fourth gear put your hand deep in her crotch when shifting too, so she had to ride in the window seat. I would have started to look like Popeye with huge forearms and a bulging left calf from the workout I got just driving to work and a bit hard of hearing from the exhaust resonating inside from the twin turbo mufflers directly under the rear seat floorboard. I did grow to love that ‘not unpleasant’ aroma that greeted my nostrils on warm days, especially in the fall when I actually rolled the windows up(about 40 turns with the ole crank, seemed like). It got about 4.5 mph and didn’t like gas below 90 octane, so I would go wait in line with the other hot Rods at the only Sunoco in town that sold aviation fuel (104 octane for about $2.25 a gallon when regular was around a buck) on Friday night and put in 8.8 gallons(20 bucks) then fill with 92 octane supreme to get me 2 nights of cruising, with an occasional 1/4 mile at full tilt(which took about 10,000 miles of rubber off the back tires), and got me to work for the rest of the week. I was PROUD of that horrendous gas mileage. And the frightening lack of stopping power. And of how hard it was to start in cold weather(pump 3x, crank and continue to pump madly as it sputtered and stumbled for about 1-1/2 minutes until that Carter AVS 4bbl warmed a bit and it would idle. THAT gave me cramps in my right calf. Clutch did the same to the left. Now, inflation adjustment doesn’t really work here, as you know, since the value of that car has skyrocketed into the stratosphere. If I had kept and restored it(didn’t need all that much) I could have asked 100 grand for it and got it easily. But back then, it’s rough demeanor, outlaw image, poor mileage and bad manners all made it somewhat undesirable. I sold it for $1200 and felt good to have doubled my investment. But I missed it and regretted getting rid of it as soon as it drove out of my driveway with a new owner at the wheel. At the stop sign, he smoked the tires halfway down the block and I got to hear how beautiful that big block sounded when turned loose from outside the car. I loved that thing like no other car I have ever had
Great story Brian. Epic car.
I can relate to that difficult decision of having to say goodbye to a old friend ( my AMX javelin) . Then regretting that day
Great story and nice car! I had too Barracudas a 67 formula S and a 69 Coupe with the 318 2 Barrel. The 67 had a fully built bored and balanced 273 with 11.8 to 1, 4 speed, elderbrock manifold, 780 double Pumper, 550 solid lift cam, and 8 and 3/4 488 gears. Best time was 12:20. A beast on the street with header mufflers and 8 MPG driving slow. Bought the car in 1978 for $800. Man those were the days!!
Currently working on my ’67 Fastback with 318 & 904 trans. Scored a 8.75″ Abody rearend housing with axles last week. Going to put 3.70 gearset in. Engine has .470″ cam with 9.75:1 squeeze. New headers installed few weeks ago and rebuilt 650 Holley. Have new steering linkage to install yet as well as swapping to 5×4.5″ disc brake on all corners. Wil be replacing damaged pass quarter and repainting whole car B5 blue with silver above body line. Hood will be matte black with blue flames outlined in silver. Hope to be done with it mid 2022. Also finishing up wifes Pontiac 1970 Tempest. Then on to 1966 Pontiac Tempest station wagon getting 454 8-71 blower. Gave up having a life for a few years obviously.
I’m late here, but this was a terrific read. How frustrating it must have been to discover the extent of the damage to the front fender area with the mounting points, etc. These 2nd generation Barracuda fastbacks are probably in my top-3 favorite Plymouths, ever, from a looks perspective. The added utility is icing on the cake.
Nice car and good stories .
-Nate
My sister has a 1997 Nissan 240SX she bought new. I’ve helped her with completely “opposite” brake switch issues…first, a spacer came out of the brake pedal switch actuator such that her brake lights would never go off..the spacer fell out somewhere on the floor and she wasn’t sure where it went, so I had to improvise another spacer.
A few years later, the same car, she had problem where the brake lights wouldn’t come on. It was electrical instead of mechanical cause, but I forget what the fix was. The car has been generally reliable, but as she’s the longest owned car in our family (my car is 3 years newer) problems aren’t unexpected. I think the biggest issue is the one I would have had if I still had my Scirocco; it suited me well 40 years ago, but now I appreciate less of a coupe and more of a sedan for ingress/egress. I’m not looking for a truck nor SUV with high access, but getting into her car has me scooting a bit lower than I like…don’t do it often, but I’m reminded every time I do that it is quite a bit lower than less sporty cars.are…and of course 2 door coupes are pretty scarce these days.