Ever since I switched from a 2bbl to a 4bbl many years ago, my transmission kickdown on my TH350 in my 1972 has been goofy. Last night, after I had finished up some work I was doing on the car I reattached the throttle cable and the transmission kickdown cable and took the car out for a ride. You can imagine my delight when the old girl dropped down into first at 40mph. I had forgotten it did this at all, I'd been so used to it just going to second.

So my question is, how do I CORRECTLY adjust the kickdown cable on my TH350?

Okay, I got it, WOW what a difference!!!

This is how I did it.

My cable has a tab you pull up, this releases the tension. I then opened the throttle all the way and then pushed the tab back down. It works perfectly! Wow, what a world of difference. I can't remember the last time the tranny downshifted correctly!!!

Perfect advice. I found my tab, pulled it up, pulled the cable to the right spot, pushed the tab back down, Presto, finished. Car kicks down awesome. Thanks. And Thanks for the Archives.

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Where is this tab located ??

At the mounting point of the cable housing on the manifold.

Some cars like my '69 Malibu don't have a tab (and spring), just a slider with clamp arrangement. The only way I could get mine to kick down was to adjust it so the cable from the trans was pulled out as far as it would go at the same time the carb reached WOT.

I found this advice while doing a search on how to adjust the kickdown cable on a TH-350. My 70 El Camino would rarely (if ever) down shift when mashing the throttle at any speed. After reading the advice previously posted in this thread, I adjusted my cable today and -- WOW! I didn't know my car could get on it like that. At 60 mph, I can give it full throttle, and the car will drop to 2nd gear and hold it up to about 80 mph. At 40 mph, I can give it full throttle and the car will shift to 1st gear and bark the tires as it takes off. I'm loving this new found performance! Thanks to the original poster for the great advice.