Maybe I misjudged the interest in this topic; I'll post a couple of pictures and see if it revives. First is a 5413-5450 by Derham owned at the time by George Hamlin. It was a left-over 1953 Henney limousine updated to 1954 and then given the Derham treatment. Picture courtesy of PAC's The Packard Cormorant.

Second is also by Derham, but much more of a coachbuilt car, one of two 47 Custom Super Clipper convertible sedans.

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Anyone know the car well enough to know if that's a correct statement?

No, but I'll be seeing the current owner in a couple of weeks and I'll try to remember to ask him. I have no doubt it's pretty heavy up front.

Owner of the Request between about 1974 and until just a few years ago was Larry Dopps of Oregon. He found the car rotting away 1974.

EDIT: Went back and read the two articles on the Request from some 30 years back. It's a driveable car, though poor handling. The two bronze U-shaped bumper sections are cast in bronze and said to weigh about 200 lbs. each, and the grille bars between 6 and 12 lbs. each. Of course this is offset a bit by the absence of the conventional bumper and grille. Also the hood is fiberglass. It's built on an early number 400 (5587-1003), was finished in late 1954, and curiously has no thief-proof number on the cowl.

The gentleman from the West Coast who owned it at the time of the PAC Centennial in 1999 subsequently sold the car to a collector in New Jersey where it is undergoing a full restoration. It was in rather deteriorated condition despite a partial restoration about 15-20(?) years ago.

I'm a bit suprised that some are just learing about www.coachbuilt.com, it's been around for quite some time and is a well-known resource, usually pretty accurate but as Randy points out, not always.

I am totally lost by these comments that people would "love" or "hate" different types or eras of Packard products. These are CARS, guys - manufactured PRODUCTS !

Peter, I suggest you read people's comments a bit too literally, or perhaps they make less than ideal word choices, maybe both. Sure the 39 Super has been controversial, especially in the era when it fought to get bona-fide Full Classic status. But I doubt any true Packard fan hates it, perhaps doesn't fawn over it would be more appropriate, or wouldn't care to own one, or not to my liking. I like all Packards, but would I want a First Series Single Six closed car with body by Pullman; no, just not my kind of car.

As to loving a car, I'm not an authority on the topic so I'll leave that to others who may dare to take it up. I'll just suggest that women and good whiskey should come first.

Kanter's product is Steele Rubber product I believe. He's sometimes a bit cheaper than buying directly from Steele. If you want very good quality, exact or very nearly exact reproduction of the original stuff, Steele either directly or via Kanter is the way to go. If your budget won't allow, I guess there is lots of generic stuff out there that might suffice.

All interesting info, but did we really answer the original question; I think he was asking more about the differences between the 39 Super Eight coupe and the 120 coupe.

If there was any doubt that a couple of extant examples constituted proof of A/C availability in the 110 model at least in 1941, the enclosed advertisement would seem to clinch the matter. From Time Magazine.

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Kev, as you know when PAC arranged for reprinting of the 33-34 Service Letters (and the later Service Counsellors as well) they edited out much of the sales stuff and thus the bound volume is not really complete as published. I do have a set of the full original letters, copies on old 3M Thermofax paper, that are turning brown and in very poor condition. If you wanted to try them, at least there should be no copyright problems but I think they'd take a bit of work, recopying and playing with contrast etc. to make decent working copies. Maybe a better offer will come along.

I thought the Banacek series primarily used two Darrins, one legit (the one that left a trail of blue smoke) and the other a mockup over a modern chassis.