I bought four shocks today for the Caribbean from a fellow who deals in obsolete shocks. He had just acquired a 55 Patrician which is a good solid car but has much surface rust. Even the doglegs are solid. He did have a disintegrated bearing on the worm end of the T/L motor. The worm gear itself seems OK. I gave him a new bearing and also told him about putting a grease fitting in the plug.
He put all new brakes and a gas line on already. I did notice something that struck me as peculiar. On the trunk the script "Packard Patrician" was chrome-plated not gold? All the other script on the car was gold. Is this normal?
In any case we have a new Packard owner and he should have it painted and on the road next year.

BIGKEVIN: Don't waste your time in trying to obtain a copy. I will take care of supplying all the information that you need. I have more than one source in my reference library.


John F. Shireman

Also on that note, if someone knows where I can pick up a copy of "Standard Catalog of American Cars 1805-1942" (preferably the latest edition) for a fair price please let me know. They are currently selling for around $380-$400 dollars on Amazon, and that is well beyond the website's meager budget.

The only parts which I replaced were in the booster, I flushed out the rest of the system with compressed air, Methelated spirits and compressed air again. I have used this method on quite a few cars (and bikes) without problems, until the Patrician and a late Eighties Nissan. Some vehicles appear to cope with the nominal seal swell (approx 7%)of the SBF, while others cannot.

Excellent! Thanks John.

I am still trying to locate a copy of the Catalog of American Cars that contains the per-war info. If I dont find one, I may need to see if you can scan some of the infomation for me from your copy if you are inclined to do so.

BIGKEVIN: I might know of a person that might be able to supply you with the pre war models information. IE general models produced for both Packard trucks and Packard car pre-war.

John F. Shireman

Some of you have sent me emails to asking if I was ok and still alive as I have been a ghost on here lately.

I am doing just fine, but I have been on the road traveling for work for the last 3 weeks. So by the time the weekend rolls around all I want to do is relax with the family.

I have been to Chicago, Dallas, Minneapolis, and am current on Amelia Island Plantation in Florida. Hopefully this is the last of my traveling for the next month or so and I can get back to things.

I have been checking the website daily to make sure nothing has come off the track, but my email and web has been limited to quick checks between flights and meetings.

I hope to begin work on the pre-war Model Info pages within the next couples of weeks. So if anyone has factory renderings/photos, or has any pre-war advertising, owners manuals or Sales Manuals/Data Books that may have photos or illustrations of the various pre-war models I would be interesting in getting copies to help with this project.

I would imagine that you are going to see me bring a series online at a time working backwards. I may also quickly put some of the 1899-1910 models up as they are pretty well documented and there were only a few models each year. The 20's-40's are going to be the hardest with when you figure in the custom bodies and one-off variants.

I will try to also create a section for the Packard Trucks if I can find anyone that has a good enough reference library to share with me.

If anyone has any contacts at either the various Packard Museums, or the any of the University of Michigan websites that has factory photos online that can help by giving us permission to use pictures the currently have for this project I would appreciate any help you can give.

Thanks again,

Peter -

I have two V8 Patricians with DOT5 silicone brake fluid running in their veins. The conversion on the first car was done by the previous owner, but I suspect it was merely a drain/flush and refill. I did the conversion on the other car, but replaced every piece of rubber in the system - including the compensator port valve stem.

Though the first Patrician has been in dry-dock for several years, I did drive it quite a bit, including a couple hundred interstate miles, but it began to exhibit some grabbing in front brakes just moving it in and out ofthe garage. The other Patrician did not see much road use as it went on the back burner when I acquired my Carib, but I can back the car in and out of the garage with no grabbing - unlike the other Pat.

The only ill-effect I noticed from the use of DOT5 was premature failure of the hydraulic brake light switch, though not consistently. It makes me wonder if a new run of switches produced with a more modern rubber might alleviate that, but I ain't holding my breath on that ever happening.

As such, I have to ask if you replaced all the rubber components - including that compensator port valve - when you converted to DOT5.

Hi all, Two posts in the one day, I must be hooked! Please be cautious in changing to silicone brake fluid (SBF)in the Esamatic brake system. I USED to convert all of my hydraulic brake cars to SBF, almost entirely because it was lubricatng to the seals and did not attract/absorb water. (currently have 4 packards on SBF)
I recently had an experience whereby about 6 months after I converted my 56 Patrician to SBF, the brakes started to not release, to the extent that on at least 3 occasions they locked the brakes up completely. My diagnosis was swelling of the main seal covering the compensator port, not allowing fluid to release back to the master cylinder reservoir. It would appear that the nominal 7% seal swell due to the SBF was sufficient to block the system, (and it is one of the most probables in the factory diagnosis). I quickly pumped and relaced the SBF with one of the low hygroscopic DOT 4 fluids and have not had any problems since. I have installed a monitoring light under the dash which indicates when there is pressure in the brake system and so long as it goes off quickly I am happy that the 7% seal swell may not be permanent and shall hopefully have no further system lock-ups. Happy Packarding Peter Toet

Update:

Tomorrow my younger brother will be coming over the help me drop the lower half of then engine back in and hopefully if time permits get the trans reinstalled. Ahh two less things to trip over in the garage.

When I had the lower half of the engine sent out to Harts machine in Ohio they sent the clutch off to Fort Wayne Clutch to have it refurbished. It is reinstalled but I am not sure how to go about checking the adjustments. Harts may have done it already. Looks like I need to make a call tomorrow to see if they did. If not does anyone have a procedure to check it?

Wednesday we will hit the body if all goes well on Tuesday. Plans for the body prep is to clean off dust then hit it with 80 grit paper on a DA (Ryobi), then hit her with some wax&grease remover, some metal prep (Picklex) since the body had been sand blasted last year there is some signs of surface rust which is what the Picklex is for. Once dry I will scuff her down and give her a coat of Epoxy Primer. With colder weather coming I wanted to get this done before then. Don't want her sitting bare again through another winter.

Will post pictures of progress.