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On these lifters, the clack noise comes from within--the plunger hitting the bottom of the barrel. The little spring you see just under the head holds the barrel up against the valve stem even when the valve is down so that a feeler gage is not too helpful.

There are three ways these lifters get noisy, apart from inadequate oil flow:

Normal wear; the column of oil leaks out between the lifter body and plunger under the pressure of lifting the valve. Usually is quiet above idle as there isn't time for the oil to leak out.

Dirt: the little check valve in the base of the lifter won't seal. I seldom encounter this in real life.

Overpressure: the lifter is asked to raise a stuck valve. The oil pressure in the lifter skyrockets and expands the lifter body permanently. Think blowing up a long party balloon. This is JD's case. The lifter is then stuck in the tappet body. I have gotten those out by removing the plunger and then collapsing the lifter body inward with many blows from a small punch. OOg.

thanks Ross, that helps me a lot to visualize where the noise could be from. I know the valves weren't stuck before I ran it, as I had the covers off and looked them all over as I turned the engine with a socket slowly - everything was moving freely. That doesn't mean they weren't stuck at some point in the distant past, though. Who knows what it went through before it got parked for good.

The noise doesn't change as the engine is accelerated, and the oil pressure has been determined to be solid.

If some of the lifters are blown like this, can I run it awhile without cracking something? Sounds like another winter project is added to the list.

I'll assume the tappet bodies are mushroom heads, or can they be removed from above (barrel)?

I'll assume the tappet bodies are mushroom heads, or can they be removed from above (barrel)?

Correct, they are removed from below after the camshaft is removed.

Are you sure you have a lifter problem? Valve noise should be one-half engine speed. You say the noise does not change with engine speed. Fuel pumps have been know to make all kinds of strange noises and it is near the lifter area.

(o{}o)

Well it doesn't change, but it does speed up in time with the rpm. I listened all around the fuel pump with my tube and didn't hear the noise there, that I can tell. But I could certainly yank it and run with the electric pump, just to test that theory. Not hard to do and couldn't hurt.

I removed the fuel pump to check JW's thought that it might be contributing to the noise. I just removed the bolts and let it hang by the lines while I started the engine, nope. That's not it, still makes the same noise. I took some cellphone video of the valves while idling, I'll have to get some tech help from the college kid to figure out how to set up a youtube account so I can share my noisy engine with y'all.

Other than the (I'm pretty sure) lifter noise the engine runs great, starts instantly every time and idles and revs nicely. Maybe I'll just insulate the hood and fenders when I put them back on and hope that quiets the din!

As for the rusty floor job, I'm halfway done with the passenger area, with the rear seat area primed. I'm starting with a palm sander using 80 grit, then a stripping wheel on my grinder. That after scraping off all the tar from the old insulating pads that were still left attached. Where the pads were still attached (tunnel, high spots) there are only small areas of rust, but the low spots of the floor where the carpet held water are pretty rusty. Still, no rusted through areas so I won't complain.

Here's another thought: Broken valve spring?

(o{}o)

I looked at the valve springs while it was running, I don't see any indications of a broken spring anywhere but I guess you don't totally know until you disassemble things. Ordinarily I would expect to see some metal shavings or displaced spring parts, didn't see any of that.

I'm buttoning things up since I'll be traveling overseas for work for the next couple of weeks. Now that I have all the cabin de-rusted and primed, I reinstalled the front seat (figured out the seat adjust geometry, this saving you guys a dumb question) after reinstalling the accelerator pedal and brake pedal, and floor panel around the brake pedal that I had out to derust/paint, then the left fender and battery. Also had to reinstall the fuel pump after the recent troubleshooting. Then I could back the car out of the hangar so I could sweep up, man what a mess from the grinding and sanding. My wife will be happy to see fewer despicably dirty clothes.

Once the car was outside and after a few speed runs up and down the hangar rows for fun, I blew out all the dust and sanding debris with an air nozzle, and vacuumed up whatever dirt I could afterwards. I don't think I will ever get all of the farm dirt out of this thing, but I can try.

Back from New Guinea, boy that is a long flight between Sydney and LA. I kept my eye out for any Packards but no joy, ha.

I was going to wash the car so it could start over with a new layer of dust but by the time I left work it was already dark and I don't have any lights, so we'll do that another time. My next step is to repaint the steering column and get ready to start running the new wires. I also still have finish cleaning up and repriming the trunk. Here are pix taken during the cleanup process in the cabin.

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HA,

When did you pass through Sydney? Although we've been moving house might have been able to set up a Packard fix if we'd known! And yes, that is a long flight, I've done it a couple of times and suffered numbus bummus! But the Sydney to Dallas flight is an hour or so longer.