1966 Barracuda Inland Shifter Rebuild

Those familiar with mid-Sixties Mopars will know that in 1966 Chrysler made a giant step backwards with their 4-speed cars. Prior to 1966 Ma Mopar had been using Hurst shifters on their A-833 4-speed cars. In 1966 though, they changed to a shifter made by Inland. The one nice feature of the Inland shifter was that it had a reverse lockout "T" handle, which is pretty cool.

The shifter in my car was woefully out of adjustment and a bit sloppy, but the main issue was that when pulling the shifter to the left to engage 1st or 2nd gear, the shifter would partially enter the reverse gate and lock out 1st/2nd gear engagement until the shifter handle was moved to the right slightly. This process got old quickly so I removed the shifter from the car and disassembled it to see what the issue was.

To get to reverse you pull up the T-handle then pull the shift handle to the left. In normal shifting the T-handle is left in the down position, so when the shift handle is pulled left for 1st/2nd, the shifter mechanism contacts a pin, which should align the shift lever to the 1st/2nd shifter slots/gates. The pin in my shifter looked fine other than the large glob of weld on the backside of the pin, but obviously the pin was either too short or the bracket had been tweaked. I wonder if someone had repaired this thing in the past and welded the pin in the wrong place, or just bent the pin's mounting tab using unnecessary force.

Whatever the case, I figure I would move the head of the pin to the right to rectify the alignment problem. I took a stab and guessed moving the pin .050" to the right might fix the problem. First order of business is to get a baseline measurement of the pin's end in relation to the shifter bracketry so I could measure any movement. I then stuck the bracket in the vise and bent the tab it until I got about .050" of rightward movement. While the shifter was out of the car I also cleaned it thoroughly.

With the shifter back together and back in the car, I adjusted the linkage and then tested it out. Wow, what a difference. The shifter's reverse lockout was aligned perfectly, and the shifter felt solid and very precise. It feels like a new shifter now.

Oh, and there must have been an uproar with Chrysler going to the Inland shifter way back when because by mid-1968 or so they changed back to Hurst shifters. Reading forums on the interweb these days you come across a lot of disrespect for the Inland shifter but I personally like the reverse lockout feature so I'll live with it in my two cars.