Big Little Block Barracuda

by Randy Holden

Photos by Rob Wolf

In the real world, outside of Mopars, it's often said that behind every successful man, you'll find a good woman. This isn't always the case with our old Mopars, as in many cases our significant others tolerate our little affliction, but don't take much of an active role. We've seen a lot of old cars sold because of the missus throws down the ultimatum and demands a literal garage sale, but this month, we have the tale of a made-in-Mopar heaven relationship that's inspirational to all of us married guys, and it involves well-known Mopar custom builder matt Delaney of Shreveport, Louisiana.

When Matt was a mere lad of sixteen years, he bought his first car; a 1973 340 Duster. This started his lifelong love for Mopars. He drove the Duster for several years, but ended up selling it while in college because of tight funds. After college, Matt met the girl of his dreams; one Cindy Mitchell. Three years later, when he convinced Cindy to marry him, Cindy found and bought back Matt's Duster from the guy Matt had sold it to, then gave it to him as a surprise wedding gift! That's when he realized this was absolutely the right girl to marry. Ho many cases can each of us cite where Mopar collections were sold off after the exchanging of vows? This is an extraordinary case where a collection was actually started and encouraged by the little lady in the sparkling dress!

Matt and Cindy have been happily married for twenty-two years, and throughout those years, Matt's built a large number of custom Dodges and Plymouths. Many of Matt's creations have gone on to national acclaim, magazine features, and a number of them have served as display vehicles at the huge SEMA show in Las Vegas. Along the way, Matt managed to accumulate a personal fleet of ten running Mopars (including the Duster) and at least ten more project cars he plans to build later. Through al of this, Cindy has been there, supportive and understanding. What more could a Mopar guy dream of?

A few years back, Cindy was putting away Matt's monthly stack of car magazines and saw a picture of a 1968 Barracuda convertible in one. The smallish A-body with the clean lines struck a chord with Cindy. She read the article and wound up thinking what an all-around great package those earlier Barracuda convertibles were. Cindy told Matt that evening, if she ever bought a muscle car for herself, a '68 Barracuda convert would be what she'd like. At this point, it helps to know a little about Matt Delaney. It doesn't take much suggestion to get his creative gears turning and once he heard Cindy mention this, the boy's brain kicked into overdrive right away. She had actually expressed interest in a old Mopar for herself! This demanded action! Without making a big deal out of the comment, Matt's mind was feverishly making plans while the rest of the evening unfolded. He decided immediately that he just had to build Cindy a '68 Barracuda to show his appreciation for the years of tolerating his incurable addiction to old Mopars. Once something like this gets into Matt's head, there's no getting rid of it until the thought has become reality. So, where's a guy in northern Louisiana supposed to find a decent starting point for a '68 Barracuda convert project? Calls started circulating within twenty-four hours, and having the network that Matt has, it didn't take long to find the machine he was looking for.

As fate would have it, Matt's good friend, Robert Stachowitz, had a largely original '68 Barracuda drop top, and once Matt explained this was going to be a driver project car for Cindy, Robert readily agreed to sell it for such a noble cause as that. Originally a low option small block car, the tired Barracuda was hauled over to Matt's shop and completely disassembled. The body was taken down to bare metal to remove all traces of rust and decay, the few minor dings acquired through the years were straightened out. Goodmark Industries and Year One supplied some repro sheet metal to deal with rust problems, then once everything was straight, the shell was primed and blocked multiple times to ensure it was slicker than a new Mercedes. Of course, Matt's known for creating awesome Pro Touring-type machines, so Cindy's little A-body wasn't going to be an exception to that pattern. As is the case with those machines, it's what lies below the skin that makes the difference.

Since this is a convertible and high horsepower was deemed essential, the original unibody construction obviously wasn't going to be strong enough. To deal with this, Matt welded in a pair of U.S. Car Tool sub-frame connectors to make the A-body seriously rigid. Suspension work is one of Matt's strong points, do for Cindy's ride, he contacted Air Ride Technologies to acquire a custom-made four-link rear combined with air shocks. This completely adjustable rear suspension holds a traditional 8-3/4" rear axle stuffed with conservative Sure Grip highway gears for ease of driving. The front suspension consists of tubular steel A-arms and a host of other components from AlterKtion, including one of their seriously low slung and wicked K-members, furnished by Bill Reilly at Reilly's Motor Sports. To haul the small mover to a halt instantly, Matt opted for big discs on all four corners from Wilwood Brakes. Given the size and weight of this thing, most brand name luxury touring sedans don't handle or stop as well as the forty-year-old Plymouth.

As the Barracuda took shape, parts boxes arrived from all parts of the country. The lenses, emblems, most trim pieces, and items such as that, generally came from Year One to replace missing or pitted original parts. Year One also supplied a new convertible top, a host of engine bay components, brackets, hoses, clamps, and way more parts than we have room to list.

Wanting to make the cockpit every bit as comfortable ad anything on the showroom floor today, once again, Matt went back to people he had worked with many times before. The tilt steering column and custom steering wheel are both from Flaming River, as is the very cool cruise control unit. Tim and Matilda Clark hand crafted the killer bucket seat interior, stitching it all together in supple white leather (that's a big help given Louisiana's muggy climate). An ear hammering Kicker stereo system and CD changer is tucked away in the dash, and speakers are carefully placed throughout the interior to provide concert sound regardless of what seat you happen to be in.

All of which is leading us up to the biggest little small block you'd ever want to see. The key to keeping a '68 A-body Barracuda happy is keeping it balanced. Many enthusiasts place big blocks or Hemi's into these cars, which is fine if you're going drag racing, but it makes them so nose heavy that their downright miserable to drive on a daily basis. There was some thought given toward placing a new Mopar Performance 5.9 Hemi into the convert, or even a ore conventional 5.7 Liter Hemi. That went away quickly once Matt saw the brand new 530 horsepower stroker 360 at the PRI Show in 2006. A masterpiece of modern engineering, the 530 horse 360-based engine is bored with a custom stroker crank, custom pistons, custom rods, you name it. This one is all-new technology from the oil pan upwards, which is precisely why Mopar Performance displayed it prominently in their booth at PRI. Looking at this thing from the outside, you expect it to be a warmed over 360, but when you find out this sucker actually displaces a legit 440 cubic inches, that gets your attention! Yes, this is a genuine 440 inch small block! Since Mopar Performance had built this engine as a test bed of sorts and used for auto show duty, they couldn't sell the engine to the general public. Thanks to their previous cooperation on other mutually beneficial projects, when Matt informed MP that he wanted one of these engines ASAP, they offered him the prototype engine displayed at PRI. Thus, this is the very first 440-inch stroker Mopar Performance small block ever built. What could be better than a lightweight small block with 530 horses? Backing up the prototype mill is a Shaffi Keisler 4L60E overdrive automatic, which allows for outstanding neck snapping acceleration and effortless high speed highway cruising as well.

Once everything was coming together, Mike Harris sprayed on the QQ1 blue metallic paint, which is actually an original 1968 Chrysler color that Cindy had liked when she saw it on a Charger Matt built for a customer. The blue/white/white combo just screams summertime fun. Putting all the steel on the ground, you'll find a set of custom Budnik Rocker wheels holding 555R Nitto Extreme radials all around.

The Barracuda was finished up not long before the Mopars at the Strip event and made its maiden voyage on the cruise from Scottsdale to Vegas. This was a really cool road trip, because Matt took his '73 Duster along as well, so the car that started it all was jockeying for position the whole way with the freshly built Barracuda. What better first road trip for a car like this than through the picturesque desert between Phoenix and Vegas?

Cindy had a blast and tells us the Barracuda rides like a luxury car, handles like a European exotic car, and takes off like a rocket any time you lay the pedal to the floor - provided that you're already going at least forty miles-per-hour. We were kinda' puzzled about that last comment too, until she clarified by saying that if you nail it at any speed below that, the car goes berserk and "acts like a skateboard on steroids." That's what five hundred horses and a light weight body will do we suppose!

There is one legitimate problem with Cindy's first Mopar muscle car, however. It seems that the car's so much fun to drive that Matt keeps bugging her to borrow it! Being a candidate for wife of the century, Cindy generally obliges, provided she can borrow the keys to some of Matt's Hemi cars or other Mopar monsters of the course! What can we say, some people are just destined for each other.