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I removed the starter cable and the 2 additional small wires from the starter of my 41 super eight. During this time I had a mental lapse and did not mark the positions of the wires. It looks like to me that the two small wires attached on the small terminal just about the battery cable, schematics are not clear. I don't want to hook up the battery when Im in question about this.

From what I see on the super 8 schematic I believe that is correct but you say terminal, singular and two wires so that makes me wonder. Are the two small wires maybe 16Ga and are there two screw terminals just above the large battery and starter terminals? Do both need wires or is one small terminal connected to the bat terminal via a jumper wire or thin copper buss bar? If it has a jumper then having two extra wires on one terminal is something different..

A question. Did pushing the starter button crank the engine even when key was off? If the car is wired as per schematic it has a version of the starter safety circuit which was used on the senior models thru 52 and works a bit differently than a typical starter circuit.

There was a possible change it could have had that would have required the key to be on to crank but that only changed one wire destination. The basics of the safety circuit would have stayed the same unless that was totally bypassed because of intermittent no crank issues.

Hi Howard, Thank you for helping me with this, It was really stupid on my part not to label wires like I usually do. I had company pop in and I guess I got distracted. I did not hook up the battery cable because I was concerned if I had it wired incorrectly I might create another problem. Besides the battery terminal on the starter, there are two small wires as you mentioned in your post. If it is okay to hook up the battery I can go ahead and see if it will start as normal or not. There are 2 small terminals or posts above the post for the battery. The small post closest to the engine appears to have not had any wire attached as far as I can tell. Does any of this make sense to you. Thank you very much again.

Using this small portion of the 1941 Super 8 A.E.A. schematic from the PAC site, the question or issue in not just hooking up the two wires you have left over is the small connection shown at the end of the arrow. That could be a wire or as some have mentioned in the past, their cars had a small formed copper buss bar between the battery terminal and one of the small terminals. One poster mentioned he had missed the connection because his had been oxidized or painted over and was all but invisible. Having one of those small terminals that appears unused on yours I think needs checking very carefully. If relay already has a battery connection then one of the two left over wires is not per the original schematic and would need to be identified as to function.

If you want to reference that AEA schematic, here is the way the original starter safety circuit is wired: power is supplied from the battery terminal thru that small connection to one side of the relay in the solenoid. The other side of the relay goes to the starter button and from the starter buttons other connection the circuit continues to the the voltage regulator ARM terminal. The circuit continues via the wire to generator and ground for the relay is actually provided by going thru the brushes and windings in the generator armature and connecting to an internal ground.

When the engine is off ground will be present and by pushing the starter button the relay will energize and bring in the starter solenoid. Once the engine is running the generator is providing voltage and because there is 6v from the battery connection at one side of the relay and now 6v from the generator at the other side of the relay there is no longer a voltage difference and the relay cannot energize thus providing the safety. That same circuit in slightly modified forms was used on senior engines thru 1952.

On the 41 the original circuit is at the ready all the time so the question of did the button crank the engine even when key is off was asked. There is anecdotal evidence that 41 cars may have been changed so power was not thru the small connection but was brought by a wire from another point that was controlled by the key. That was the way Packard did it in 42 when they went to the carb starter switch but whether it actually started with a factory change earlier or was a retrofit suggestion to dealers on previous models is open to question. If your car has that change then connecting the two wires would be reasonable.

The other unknown is whether the safety circuit was eliminated on your car. Because of issues with bad brushes or other problems with the generator there were reports of intermittently the cars wouldn't crank because there was no ground to the relay. Packard issued a series of articles to troubleshoot the circuit and a suggestion of bypassing as a final solution for those cars where owners had repeated problems. This was done by providing a solid ground instead of going thru the generator. No idea how many cars might have had that done.

I see no reason you couldn't hook up the battery and leave the two wires hanging. Use a voltmeter on both the small terminals and verify neither is connected to the battery. Then check both wires and see if either has power with or without the key being on. If neither terminal is connected to the battery and one of the wires has power at some point then go ahead and hook up the two wires to the two terminals. If there is a battery connection present on a terminal then both of the wires will have to be traced and find where they go because one of them will be doing something else.

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The camera on your phone is one of the best tools I have used in my restoration of my Packard. I had the car apart for several years. Without pictures as a reference, I would have been in serious trouble upon reassembly.

Also different sizes of Ziplock bags that are clearly labeled!