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Board index » All Posts (Keegan)




Re: March 12th Update
Home away from home
Home away from home

Keegan Chaput
Thanks Craig,

I'm working my way towards the brakes and I'll address those issues as a group when I'm done with the suspension and steering. I did the drums because they were already off, but the rest of the braking system is in need of freshening. When I'm ready, I'll pick your brain about solutions to the known problems.

Thanks for checking out my project.

Posted on: 2008/3/14 9:32
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Re: March 12th Update
Home away from home
Home away from home

Keegan Chaput
Great tip! I used the torque specs in the Service Manual which recommended to tighten the nut to 20lbs then back off to the nearest open castle slot. I don't think I spun the hub while tightening, just afterwards to check for binding or slop. Maybe I'll back it off and tighten it again using your method.

Posted on: 2008/3/13 10:11
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March 12th Update
Home away from home
Home away from home

Keegan Chaput
Update March 12, 2008.

Well I'm elbow deep in the front wheel assemblies. I started with the driver's side by pulling the wheel and brake drum/hub off. The grease was dark brown but there didn't appear to be any water in it which I took as a good sign. I was pretty surprised by the vast amount of gunk that had formed around every grease boot and fitting. It took considerable time to chisel it away carefully so as not to damage any rubber bits that could be reused. Once cleaned, I checked for any play in the hub and support arms and found none.

The brake drum was grooved up pretty good so it went out for turning at my local tire shop. When it came back it was as good as new, so I cleaned out the hub and checked the bearing races for the inner and outer bearings. The races checked out ok, but the bearings themselves were shot. My guess is flat spotted from sitting in the same place for a couple of decades. I was also in need of a new grease seal that installs in the hub on top of the inner bearing. I found the bearings and grease seal at my local NAPA store for a reasonable price. Inner Bearing (Timken 15123) $10.49, Outer Bearing (Timken 09067) $11.49 and the grease seal (NOS 17285) for $11.54. I purchased enough to do the passenger side as well.

Next to come off was the shock absorber. It gave a little bit of a fight but finally relented on the top mount and the lower mounting plate was removed with the shock attached for removal on the bench. I ended up snapping the stud on the lower mount in my efforts to remove the hardware. The rubber isolators had rotted away and the shock itself had outlasted its life expectancy. I found replacements (Monroe 5751) at my local O'Reilly Store for 22.99 apiece.

Because of all the crud I wanted to remove the knuckle support to clean out the bushings and rubber boots. The support came out pretty easily after removing the lower and upper support pins and I was able to clean it up to my satisfaction.

With the jack supporting the lower control arm I decided that I would remove the coil spring and the lower control arm to clean them up and hit them with some paint. I lowered the control arm ever so slowly and allowed the spring to come to full extension. I was standing well out of the way of the spring, just in case it decided to come out on its own with authority. With the spring out of the way, the control arm was removed after more chiseling of crud on the fasteners.

The control arm was pretty dirty, but otherwise in good shape. The movement on the pivot arm was smooth, so I just cleaned them up and squeezed some new grease in the fittings. After cleaning, a coat of oil based flat black rust-oleum was applied to the control arm and the freshly cleaned coil spring.

After the paint dried (ok, it wasn't completely dry) I started reassembly. Everything went back in smoothly, but I found that I was missing a rubber o-ring that acts as a grease boot on the lower mounting pin for the knuckle support. I went ahead and put it back together anyway because it won't be on the road for a while and I need it to be able to roll around the shop. It was also missing the rubber coil spring dampeners that had rotted beyond repair. I don't think I'll spend much time searching for replacements.

Now the passenger side: Everything started the same but when I got the brake drum/hub off (which also got turned at the tire shop) I noticed that the steering knuckle had some free play that seemed to be coming from the lower bushing area.

After driving out the pins holding the knuckle to its support I could see the lower bushing was galled. The upper needle bearing still looks good though so I think I can get away with keeping that one in.
Today, after doing a little searching, I ordered a pin rebuild kit from Kanter for about $100 ouch! It has new pins, bushings and bearings; enough to rebuild both knuckles. I guess that I'll have some spare parts on hand for any future repairs unless anyone out there needs to rebuild one of their own.

I'll be stalled until the parts arrive sometime next week. In the meantime I'll try to resist the urge to begin on a different part of the car. I'm also not going to press out the current bushing until the parts arrive so I can compare them, just to make sure.

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Posted on: 2008/3/12 23:07
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Re: THANKS BIGKEV!
Home away from home
Home away from home

Keegan Chaput
Brian, I wanted to say THANK YOU for the huge contribution of the parts manual and what must have seemed like a never ending task of scanning. It feels like cheating to restore my car with the information I have available as opposed to so many of you who did it solo.

THANK YOU!!!

Posted on: 2008/3/11 20:46
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Re: Keegan's 55 Clipper Deluxe
Home away from home
Home away from home

Keegan Chaput
The old brake pedal lie detector is telling me that it hasn't been around the horn yet. Which means that I'm still replacing parts, just from neglect instead of being worn out.

Posted on: 2008/3/9 0:02
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Re: Sway Bar Bushing Upgrade
Home away from home
Home away from home

Keegan Chaput
Quote:

Packard53 wrote:
Keegan: That is a real nice way of mounting the front sway and the new bushing mounts that you made up.

The main mounting brackets for my sway bar were undamaged, but the outer clips on the a-arms were broken. So I sent for new sway bar bushings, and came up with this solution on securing the new outer sway bar bushings. I went to local hardward store and purchased some angle iron. Cut the angle iron mounted the new retaining brackets drilled and botled them to the a-arm.


Thanks! I like your solution. It must of cost the better part of $5 and you know that it's never going anywhere. Not to mention that you'd really have to look hard to notice anything's been changed. When I saw those sheet metal clips for the first time I wasn't filled with confidence. Mine were in good shape so I kept them just in case I find out that my Clipper Deluxe was owned by Elvis and I have to put it back to stock.

Posted on: 2008/3/8 23:57
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Re: Keegan's 55 Clipper Deluxe
Home away from home
Home away from home

Keegan Chaput
Quote:

AL wrote:
With spending 25 year behind a barn I would assume that the 45K mileage figure is not 145K


That's what I'm thinking as well. Just for my own curiosity I've thought about tracking down as many of the previous owners as possible to get a more accurate history of the car. I wonder if North Dakota DMV would have any records that they would release.

Posted on: 2008/3/7 17:22
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Re: Sway Bar Bushing Upgrade
Home away from home
Home away from home

Keegan Chaput
Hi Turbo,

I'm a cheap SOB. I use what I've got laying around and it really only took a couple of hours of work. As far as handling goes, I'm not going to be carving any corners in the Clipper. That's what I have my R1 for .

Posted on: 2008/3/6 14:47
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Re: Keegan's 55 Clipper Deluxe
Home away from home
Home away from home

Keegan Chaput
I'm starting with the suspension and steering systems. There's plenty of gunk and rotted rubber to tend to. I'm going to work front to back starting with the sway bar. It took some damage and bent one of the inner brackets and the driver's side bar end was completely out of the bushing. I decided to make some new brackets and use polyurethane bushings. I did a write-up and pics here...
https://packardinfo.com/xoops/html/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=788&forum=3&post_id=5660#forumpost5660

I used Energy Suspension PN# 9.5122G which are the 18mm universal sway bar bushings. Two sets ran $27.66. I used the 18mm because the sway bar spec'd out at 18.4mm and I was afraid of the bar being too loose with the 19mm bushings. Time will tell if I made the right choice, but it's pretty cheap to swap out replacements if need be.

Next are the front wheel assemblies including Shocks upper and lower support arms and rubber grease boots.

Posted on: 2008/3/6 11:25
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Keegan's 55 Clipper Deluxe
Home away from home
Home away from home

Keegan Chaput
I'm going to take full advantage of a project journal that I can't possibly loose or get grease on or set fire to!

A quick background is in order: I purchased the car February 8, 2008 and drove it home the next morning. I paid $1000 for it with the proceeds from selling my 54 Chevy for $1300. It was originally a North Dakota car, but spent the last 25 years or so sitting behind a car dealership in St. Cloud, MN.

The trip home was interesting. The weather was in the teens and I had about an hour drive to my shop while enjoying the fresh-air vents that time had created for me in the floor. The roads were pretty clear though and it didn't quit on me, though the transmission did have a hard time finding a gear that it liked.

My goals for the car are to have a reliable driver that is safe and fun to drive and not to spend my kids college fund before I have a chance to save it. I would like to keep it original looking, but I have no problem upgrading areas for safety, reliability, and comfort. Let's face it, this car was probably the cheapest Packard on the lot at the time is was originally purchased. I don't believe that I'm hurting the value of it by changing out original parts for upgrades here and there.

I want to do the car in small projects. I'd like to keep it drivable as much as possible and together as much as possible. If I have to ignore it for a few months I don't want to come back to a pile of parts and no memory of where they go. (Go ask my old Camaro how that plan worked out for it!)

I'll try to document as much of it as possible with pictures and for my own curiosity, I'll keep a running tally on major purchases for parts and labor.

Finally, I'd like to point out that I'd never have attempted this without a resource as great as packardinfo.com!

Running Tally:
Car Purchase----------$1000
New Battery------------$35
Brake Drums Turned--$30
Wheel Bearings---------$44
Grease Seals-----------$23
Front Shocks-----------$46
King Pin Rebuild Kit---$103
Windshield/Front Seat Combo---$225 (Thanks PackmanDon)

Current Total:--------$1506

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Posted on: 2008/3/6 1:36
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