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Plymouth Barracuda 1969 Formula S 383 - Sunfire Yellow Highway61 1:18
1969 found Plymouth® in an enviable position: the 1968 Barracuda was powerful and popular, but how to improve on success? In typical `60s Plymouth fashion, they just made it faster. A few cosmetic changes were made here and there, including a new grille and larger side marker lights, but Plymouth made it clear that their "go to dinner" car, as they called it, was a "go to the dragstrip" car as well. The 225ci slant six and the 318ci V8 were still the baseline engine options. The successful 340ci four-barrel V8 was carried over from 1968 while the 383ci four-barrel V8 got an upgraded crankshaft that delivered upwards of 330hp for the Formula S package. But the big news was the premiere of the `Cuda high-performance package for the 340 and 383 engines, and in the spring of 1969 Plymouth installed their monstrous 440ci V8 for the first time in a street-legal 375hp package. The tried-and-true 440 was capable of rocketing the lightweight `Cuda from zero to sixty in 5.5 seconds and running a 14.10-second quarter mile. Plymouth now had bragging rights to the largest engine in the escalating pony car wars....but with those came headaches.
Plymouth® had finally wrangled a power steering unit under the hood for the 383 Barracuda by 1969, but the 440 left no room for power steering or power brakes. With more than half of the `Cuda`s weight now over the front tires, braking and low-speed handling suffered accordingly. Mopar engineers feared a four-speed manual would eventually shred the rear end, so the 440 `Cudas were fitted with a TorqueFlite automatic. The off-the-line performance disappointed many enthusiasts as the TorqueFlite couldn`t upshift as crisply as a manual, and more often than not left the rear tires spinning. But on an open road or straightwaway, the 440 `Cuda`s power more than enough made up for its poor handling characteristics. Whlie the 1969 `Cuda couldn`t be labeled a complete success, Mopar engineers marked the lessons learned, and would put them to use soon enough.
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