Re: 1940 Packard 1801 won't start

Posted by HH56 On 2017/1/5 16:48:00

One thing some have run into is varnished up valve stems causing sticking valves which came on suddenly after burning old fuel. As some will attest, it can happen overnight having said they drove and parked the car and then went to start it in the next day or so and had symptoms similar to yours. Since your car was running -- I assume with fresh fuel in the relatively recent past -- valve sticking is less likely but still something to be considered.

I would remove one of the valve covers to observe the valves and verify they are moving. If you see some stuck then more would be suspect. If you find them moving then it would be a matter of seeing if something has happened to the timing.

If the timing has jumped I would think it would be possible to verify that by checking the ignition timing. Since the distributor is driven off the camshaft, if the spark timing is found to be out of spec the valve timing would be suspect too.