Dear Miguel:

It sounds like your car has a generic voltage regulator on it rather than the original cut out.

One model that is available is the Standard Motor Products VR-8 which is 1954 Chevrolet. It will need to be polarized for your system which is included in the instructions.

If you can find a parts store with a printed Stant catalogue you can size up the numbers for a 160 degree thermostat. I know I have put at least one of them up on this site somewhere, but that was for the wide mouth. You can fit that to the small mouth using a bench grinder.

As for the cylinder head, take it to a machine shop and have them check the decking. If it looks like it has been milled already it may be junk. The limit on milling for the Eight is .045 according to one noted expert. Too much cylinder pressure will blow gaskets.

Also you can make tools to lift the head from bolts or old spark plugs. They look like T-handles and screw into the spark plug holes.

In the Packard 8 the difference is not so noticeable, but go back to the 3 vs 5 main bearing four cylinder motors and the difference is clearly audible. Noise generally indicates distress which is why virtually all fours today have five mains. However, that long crankshaft in the Packard is a delicate issue that takes a lot of energy to spin.

The specifications for pistons with expansion struts is still valid. The .0005-.001 is a general rule of thumb still in use in current texts, although for anything other than OEM parts the correct source is the piston manufacturer. That specification ideally should be included in writing on company stationary. The OEM Packard stuff was also tin plated to prevent scuffing.

I have heard lots of complaints about this and that cast piston, but the problem is that the undersquare L-head seems very prone to piston noise which is prevented by running pistons with expansion struts and tight clearances. To prevent noise complaints many machinists were running clearances well under the .002-.025 used for cast and forged merchandise.

This is too bad because it resulted in many blocks being re-machined, over machined, cracked, whatever. For some reason I recall manufacturer's service agents quoting clearances over the phone that were wrong so if your machinist has any doubts I would pursue the matter via non-verbal correspondence from the manufacturer.

Dear wedrivethemall:

I assume you can blow through the heater hose going to the cylinder head. Sometimes those valves are clogged or soldered shut to prevent leaks.

The check what OD said about the oil cooler housing is an easy test. Take off the radiator hoses and fill the system with a hose via the motor outlet. If it backs up easily you have a flow problem. If you want to use a block off plate the water jacket needs to be modified from the backside to allow flow.

I once dealt with a case as follows: The temperature gauge would read 160-180 and it would spout water out the radiator. My inclination was cracked block so I called around for a place with a five gas emissions analyzer to test for CO in the radiator vapors. I got absolutely nowhere because nobody understood what I was talking about. "You want to test whaaaat?"

So I bought some CO test strips from McMaster-Carr, put them under plastic cup sealed to the top of the radiator, sealed the overflow tube with a cork, and ran the motor.
When the test came back negative I fixed a hole in the filler neck, made a new seal for the radiator cap, lowered the overflow tube (it was even with the very top of the filler neck), and let the coolant seek it's own level.

Sometimes these old motors have have problems when the coolant level is too high. I dealt with a Caddy 12 that did the same thing for years. If you filled the coolant too high it would spout out the radiator cap until it got to a certain level. The temperature gauge never got very high. It could have been cavitating, but it didn't use water and so the owner jut drove it that way.

Be wary of fakes.

The first three digits of the vehicle number should be 761 which is the body style number. And preferably on an original vehicle plate.

I knew an old time Packard guy who owned a dozen Packard phaetons until he finally found a dual cowl car which he had restored. It took him years to find one and he told me that there aren't many real ones floating around. The ratio was like ten to one.

Dear 39six:

The photos I posted were for a 1940 Packard 160 that was wrecked while being driven drunk by two now deceased well known Packard aficiondos.

The car was cut up and kept secret, and one of the wheels was bent. When I found the wheels in a pile of parts owned by a belligerent I was dealing with he accused me of causing the damage. I never told him why the wheel was damaged but I did mention it to a number of his friends. I felt that was the best way of getting even for that kind of gutter snipe behavior.

I would not put the gauges inside the car. The correct practice is to tape them to the windshield (the manual notwithstanding). A while back I fixed an Ultramatic that had previously blown a trans line inside the car. No matter what I did the inside of the car looked liked tranmission fluid. The problem with the trans had nothing to do with pressure and everything to do with a Packard TSB.

As for running cars on jack stands I don't like that for anything other than testing if 4WD works or low speed noise. If the pump pressure or high range clutch is bad you don't need to turn the wheels, but for the groaning you want to see the pressures during fault mode.

I finally took a look at that Paramount soundtrack and the tracks credited to Riddle sound like charts taken from the Untouchables and other TV shows he wrote music for. The tango charts and minor key mood stuff just sounds like they are running scales up and down.

The tracks that say Riddle/Berlin sound like more TV stuff with a few bars of Berlin chorus thrown on top here and there.

About the only reason to sue over that would be if record sales were much higher than expected and Berlin didn't get paid after the intial pressing.

However, it has been a long time since I played that record and upon reflection I think that Hollywood professional Irving Taylor could have done a better job than Riddle.

As to this new movie, after watching the trailer I am not going to waste my time even after it ends up free on youtube. In a word - terrible. The Paramount production hacked up the book to a tolerable degree, but there are live productions of the book that are read verbatim. I don't think the movie business can go much lower than this junk.

Amazing organ John. I can't play like that and have to stick to stock Dixieland charts.

Dear GTO:

Probably the Direct Drive Clutch or the High range clutch slipping from too little pump pressure resulting from worn bushings.

At 45-50 mph the motor is at its optimum torque to rear wheel range and so stress is highest. If you take the pages from the manual to a transmission builder they should be able to hook up gauges and check the pressures on the road.