This 1965 Rambler Marlin has just about every box checked: it’s a one-owner car, an actual barn find, it has a mere 24,000 miles, it has a 327 V8, and the rare twin-stick manual transmission. What. A. Car! The seller has it listed here on eBay in Eureka, Montana and the current bid price is just over $7,000 but the reserve isn’t met yet. Here is a photo of the original owner from when the seller picked it up.
Here it is all cleaned up. One thing the seller mentions is that both front fenders have been repainted so they show a little differently compared to the rest of the original 55-year-old paint. Speaking of the paint, you can see that it has taken on the ever-popular patina that’s all the rage now and is almost impossible to duplicate other than from the passage of time.
The Marlin was new for 1965 and it was known as a Rambler Marlin that year and had a decidedly Rambler Classic look to it, or at least the front clip did. That’s exactly the car that it was based on as it came out of the concept stage. The following year they would be known as the Marlin and in 1967, their last year on the market, they were the AMC Marlin. Yes, I want all three years, is that so wrong?
This ’65 Marlin was bought new in Montana and was owned by one gentleman until May 12th when the seller purchased it. The original owner parked it – I’m guessing under that carport/shed shown in the photo in the first paragraph – in 1985 and it’s been sitting there ever since. That may explain the weathered paint, but as far as rust goes, it doesn’t have any, other than surface rust. The underside looks solid.
Marlin interiors were a step above the competition and this one looks great. It’s unusual to see a passenger-side seat worn out before a driver’s seat is. The back seat is very cool and it looks perfect. You can see the famous manual Twin-Stick.
The top engine is in this car, a 270-horsepower 327 cubic-inch V8 with a four-barrel carb. The seller says that they have it running on a bottle of gas, they bypassed the gas tank because it’s been sitting for so many years. It also has power steering and power brakes. This looks like an almost once-in-a-lifetime find to see such a heavily-optioned rust-free car with such low miles. What are your thoughts on this Marlin?
Oh Man. That makes my heart thump. I had a 64 classic 770 that I had a 327 dropped into. That sweet, silky smooth, torquey piece of heaven. It was so quiet that at stop lights, passengers thought my car had stalled. I out-ran a road raged 4 wheeler by turning right in front of 2 lanes of traffic from the middle left hand turn lane. When the light turned green, I stomped on it and was across those two lanes before the cars in those lanes could even start moving. He had his hand on my door handle and looked quite surprised when my sleeper left him in dust. I want this Marlin! Though, she looks the part!
First one might explain what a twin stick is 😂
The Twin-Stick was introduced in 1963 by Rambler and effectively gave you five forward gears. Two levers sat parallel to each other on the console, and the method for shifting was starting in first, engaging second, then activating the overdrive, then shifting into third, and then activating overdrive. If you were among the less dextrous drivers out there, there was a button on the shifter that allowed you to activate the overdrive without all the fun or fuss of the Twin-Stick. The only rear gears for this transmission was 3.54 whether it was a six or a V-8.
The 327 by the way is not Chev 😂
I wish they would have put a close up of marlin emblem on back. That fish 🎣 is wild 👍
I like them very much…
Its a charger nope its a Marlin Baby 👍
Thanks for explaining as I was dying to understand how it worked, much appreciated
How well spaced were the ratios?
Should there be be a point where you deactivate overdrive to get 3rd then activate overdrive to get 4th?
Obviously still a little confused.
Great Mad Max imagery though.
327’s are big enough to be torquey and small enough to wrap the hell out of them. This must have half killed to old man. It would be like selling your old dog. The interior and engine compartment are the real prize. That interior should be in the Smithsonian. I have never seen one this clean. The twin shifters are a hoot. I can’t get over the interior. You know I was going to pass on looking at this car and I am glad that I did.
I am picturing my rather spastic dog, who tends to lose all control on a regular basis, sitting behind the wheel of this car, tongue hanging out of the side of her mouth, arms flailing while she tries to shift the shifters lol.
THAT’s a dog ya don’t wanna sell, bra!
She’s a G o o D girl…
Lol she is!
Another 60’s era car with a trailer ball on the back. Seems at least half of the cars then had balls.
My 65 Barracuda has one. I’ve never towed any thing behind it but it’s at the perfect height to intercept my shins when I am loading stuff in the trunk,
That’s actually what they were designed to do. Few people know that. It was only after the “shin buster” hit the market that people realized they could also tow things with them.
My dad had a 1965 Barracuda that he brought new and drove daily until 1982. In about 1966 he added a hitch so he could flat tow a 1937 Ford sedan from El Paso, Texas where he was in the army back to Toledo, Ohio.
He nearly lost both cars when all 5 lug nuts on one of the Ford’s wheels came loose. He fortunately heard them rattling in the hub cap and pulled over to check. Popped one of the caps off and all 5 lug nuts fell on the ground. The wheel and studs were well worn.
The other half were female!
Yeah, well, torque is something the kids of the 1980’s and 1990’s really don’t understand. It’s muffler bearings to them. Cars in the 1960’s were meant to be USED. Showboating was for rich stuffed shirts and men with certain inadequate features of their anatomy, like really small noses. The first light trucks were based on a car. Take Australian cars, they have always been overly robust because a lot of roads there are really monster truck tracks. You bought a car for transportation and work back then. If it can work and kick ass, more the better. Hardly anybody bought a pickup truck back then. You need to talk to your grandpa or great-grandpa more. I bet Chevrolet has the towing capacity of the Volt available.
Hate to burst anyone’s bubble here, but the “kids of the 1980s and 1990s” are now in their thirties and forties. Hopefully not acting like kids. But I get your point. 2020 came too soon for me too!
Wonderful to see a Marlin !!
Perhaps the seats were switched
Left to right ……you know
Just like most everybody I love the Marlin’s fastback roofline. As I’m not in the AMC crowd I find Marlins to be a very hard vehicles to put any price tag on – I mean where do you locate model-specific bits and how many comparable examples are there really?
There was a much better white and blue ’65 Marlin also a Twin Stick featured here on BF in Feb priced at 10.5k that really got my heart thumping
Parts are hard to get and expensive. My Twin Stick Marlin is fully restored. It was an expensive product. Lots of people putting money into these.
We go through this every time with Marlins. Many are featured by Scotty, who, like the Subaru Brats, has a strong hankerin’ for one. Pal, if I had $7g’s, it would be showing up at your front door. Maybe someday, buddy.
On to the Marlin itself. Everybody ooh’s and ahh’s about the Marlin, and it is a neat car, but not in the mid-60’s . Growing up in Milwaukee, we took quite a ribbing with the Marlin. It became the butt of all jokes, and tarnished Ramblers reputation even more. While fastbacks were nothing new, one coming out of Wisconsin was laughable. Very few were sold, it just wasn’t what people who liked Ramblers were looking for, and a tough sell for those that didn’t. Devoted Rambler fans, like me, laughed as well. It wasn’t the price. A ’65 Marlin listed for $3,100 dollars, only $75 dollars more than a regular 2 door. It was just too odd. If it only had a hatchback. Fantastic find, coolest car of the century ( for AMC fans) worth every penny.
I was 8 years old back in ‘65’ and my grandfather worked on the assembly line at Rambler. I remember he was so excited about the new Classic Marlin coming out. He brought me home a dealer promo model of one. He thought they were going to set the world on fire with that one. He was was real disappointed when Rambler gave up on it. He said the Charger even took a few years to catch on, and they should have given it more time and maybe a facelift. A couple of years later he brought home one of the first ‘68’ Javelins built. It was the first one any of us saw on the streets. Pretty exciting back then.
Let me be the one to mention it this time….wonder how much the seller paid to get it from the old man? And at what price must one bid to reach reserve now that it has been cleaned and detailed for you? I’m not trying to be arrogant, I’m jealous because it came out so nice. Oh, but it hasn’t been driven, brakes and fuel tank need tending, oh nevermind.
“WE DID NOT TRY TO DRIVE IT, ENGAGE THE TRANSMISSION/CLUTCH, OR FOOL WITH THE BRAKES” yikes.
It looks like this car has the rare electric windshield wiper option! (Almost as rare as the Twin-Stick!)
Careful about the brake system on ’65 Marlins, they came standard with power Bendix discs using fixed 4-piston calipers on the front. Parts are still available but $$$.
Rear brakes are more of a problem. AMC got away with not having a proportioning valve by using a unique “non-servo” rear drum brake that approximated the action of the front disks. Forget about getting parts today for that rear brake system. They do not exist. All of the online parts catalogs are wrong, they show standard type Bendix drums in the rear and these are a horse of a different color entirely.
Probably the best approach would be to install a standard drum system back there and plumb in a proportioning valve.
Most 1966+ Marlins have drum brakes (discs were made optional for ’66) so if working on a later Marlin you likely will not run into this problem.
I am confused with the one owner claim. So, is this a one owner or a 2 owner car?
I assume that I would be buying and paying the second owner, and getting an open title with the original owner on it. Is that legal? Doesnt the guy selling the car have to title it before he can sell it?
Maybe this owner is selling it for the original owner?
Getting an “open” title is not uncommon in the used car market.
Nice guy, I totally agree. It is now a 2 owner car, irrespective of whether the title is changed or not. I just “love” it when these flippers advertise “one owner cars”. False advertising. Here in Australia you could be in trouble for false advertising.
Niceday, I meant to write, not niceguy.
It sounds like a 2 owner car to me. Open titles are illegal, but as someone else stated, seems to be normal.
Truth is, the car would still be sitting in that open air shed if it weren’t for this flipper. If he hadn’t pried it away from the old feller, another flipper might have, and they might not have done this car justice. I just hope the old guy got a fair price for it too.
Did They ever make any go fast parts for these cars?
Not much. I remember seeing a black and white photo of a Marlin dragcar in Hot Rod magazine in 66-67. Probably in a Super Stock class. I don’t recall who or where, maybe the Winternationals. It had Cragar 5 spokes and a paint job similar to a Sox and Martin car. Being B&W I have no idea what the colors were, It’s possible it was a red, white and blue scheme.
You could get intake manifolds, headers and camshafts but there was never a big selection. AMC had several mechanical idiosyncrasies at that time, torque tubes, two piece rear axle shafts, front coil springs above the upper control arms. The engines were unexciting. It would take lots of work to make a Marlin perform well enough to be taken seriously.
Fortunately AMC figured it out and created the Javelin and AMX.
Working as an on-site technician in the 80’s I frequented junk yards on weekends. In Arizona I found a twin stick rambler convertible, that feature amazed me, very few parts had been removed, to ship it back to MA was an $1800 cost! I didn’t, but the joy of driving a twin stick car still haunts my love of three pedal cars. The yard offered it to me at $150, very sad a rust free AZ car was lost for probably minor mechanical needs.
“Jaf” referenced this as a 4 speed, I am quite sure this was a 3 speed only option.
think this is a great muscle car option. it looks like an older plymouth Barracuda, but it is it’s own unique style of this vehicle. I think this car is sensational, but it is worthy of a buyer who is going to sit down and do the research as to how to maintain it and preserve its originality.
I saw right away the rare 1965 Rambler with electric wipers instead of the standard AMC vacuum wiper used in all Ramblers/ AMCs through I believe 1971. Also the AMC mid-sized cars (Classic, Ambassador, Marlin, through 1966 were probably the last American cars with a driveshaft inside a torque tube. In 1967 AMC had an all new mid-size unibody, a little longer and wider, more stylish and they had a regular driveshaft. So the last Marlins in 1967 had nicer lines and a regular driveshaft. I’ve seen a few pictures of 1965-66 Classics and Marlins that were converted to open driveshaft with all new fabricated rear suspension and wondered how big a project was that!
Beautiful interior! It should be in the Smithsonian. The twin stick is a anti-theft device today.
Just looked at the ebay photos and noticed none taken from underneath – caveat emptor! My own Marlin looks almost as nice as this one up top but the underside is scary as h-e-double-hockey-sticks! (Rotted out rockers and the floors are a patchwork of pop-riveted repairs. Would have to be sold as a parts car if and when the time comes.)
Bob19006 mentioned the torque-tube drive. The driveshaft on V8 Marlins (and Classics/Ambassadors) of this vintage use a double U-joint behind the transmission, inside the tube. The dual U-joint assembly uses parts that are made of unobtainium. Even if the universals themselves are good you’ll get bad vibrations when the unavailable centering joint wears. The fix is to have a custom shaft made with a single joint as used on 6-cylinder models.
There is also a big rubber cushion where the torque tube meets the transmission that absorbs the shock of driving and braking forces. When this deteriorates the rear axle will dance around under acceleration and braking. I think there is a repro part available.
didn’t the Tempist have a TqTube, frnt engine and rear trans axel?
May B the worse I ever wrked on was the frnt engine, frnt transaxel (Prelude – as in quaaLudes). Try’n change a clutch…
Twin Shifters ??? How did that work? I,ve never heard of that until now,BUT i like this car
I had a friend in high school who’s dad had one of these red on red well his dad like mine and everyone elses dad never changed the oil and the engine died. His dad gave him the car to tinker with and boy did he, he pulled the engine found out the cost to rebuild it when another friend wrecked his Firebird so, they decided to pull the drive train and creat a Pontiac/Marlin. Let me tell you it wasn’t the safest car on the planet but man that thing flew. The Pontiac 350 wasn’t stock so you knew it had something under the hood. We sure had good times in the 70s
Not for one moment do I believe the 24 000 mile claim
Howard A is correct on how the Marlin was perceived in the muscle car era–they were just not taken seriously. It had go be GM, Ford or MOPAR when brand an appearance were just as important as actual performance.
The twin stick is reminiscent of the twin stick Brownies on older heavy trucks.
Actually Tom, the “twin stick Brownies” on trucks were 2 separate transmissions, on this, as others said, the far stick just actuated an electric O/D switch.
Surprisingly Hot Rod magazine gave the Marlin a very favorable road test and review in their June 1965 issue.
https://www.hotrod.com/uploads/sites/21/2012/01/hrdp-1965-june-cover.jpg
When I was a kid my best bud’s dad had one of those Same color, too. I may be wrong, but I think it had a black stripe running over the hood, roof, and trunk. I thought it was cool then, and still do now.
I have the Corgi toy of the Marlin painted that way, 1/43rd scale. Many of the real cars were. But not the hood….
Nice Marlin! I had a dual-range twin-stick in my ’84 Dodge (Mitsubishi) Colt GTS Turbo. This Rambler Marlin is loaded with style and utility. I like it!
Well I’ve bought this one too!! Cant wait to get it to CT!!!