For some of the young'uns in the crowd...Mopar engineers were fighting a losing battle as the death-spiraling company had outdated cars and there wasn't much money to develop new parts like an overdrive auto transmission, at least not an inexpensive one. But they still had to meet CAFE regulations or pay a fine per car sold.

So they "faked" an overdrive by installing 2.45 or 2.29 gears in the rear. The car was ALWAYS in a sort of overdrive. To get the car to start rolling with a 130 hp 318 or a 95 hp 225, they put deeper First gears in the transmission. This could be done on the cheap.

If they help or not on the dragstrip depends mostly on the car and to some extent on the driver.

R.