Re: What is this Packard?

Posted by BigKev On 2022/11/21 11:06:58

The other shoe.....


So, I know the story on this car, but it has enough mismatch of parts and custom bodywork to make people scratch their heads looking at it. So I thought I'd have a little fun before I tell the story about it.

So this 1937 115-C Convertible Coupe (1089) came from the estate of Mark Lambert in Nashville. The car was stored out at his "farm" in Southern Indiana.

So why is this car interesting and important to me?

So circa 2005, I was watching this show called "Classic Car Restoration" on the DIY network. It was hosted by Mark, and he was doing a restoration on a 1938 Packard Coupe. Before then, I'd really never ever even heard of a Packard. So I watched his 9 or 10-part series on restoring this car, and he made the process very logical and approachable. You can find the series on YouTube if you give it a search

So after watching that, I started poking around on eBay and found my '54 and bought it for $500. The rest, as they say, is history. Watching that showing started me down my Packard journey, and through that sprung PackardInfo.

So without Mark doing that show, there would not have been a PackardInfo.

I'd met Mark a couple of times in person at various meets, and I had told him how his show inspired me to get my Packard.

So Mark sadly passed away earlier this year, and his wife Leslie is in the process of settling the estate.

One of the cars is this 1937. David Flack, knowing I was interested in another project, put me in touch with Leslie an I had told her this story about Mark's show starting me down my Packard journey.

So she thought I should have this car, and so here it is.

Now I'll cover everything about this car in a new project blog, but in a nutshell, this car was a conglomeration of spare parts and donor cars.

Mark had restored many cars over the years, both professionally for customers and personally for himself. He was also a Judge at Pebble Beach. So he had done many perfectly restored cars.

This car was not meant to be that. This was meant to be a fun play car. His interpretation of a 50's era hot rod that was found in a barn.

So he put together whatever he had in extra parts and applied the patina to play the part. It has custom body work done to the fenders (front and back) and running board delete done to it, and he crafted that split rear bumper and fold-down spare tire. Inspired from a 36 Ford, David belives.

The other big change to this was that it has an early 60s Jaguar XK motor in it. (Twin overhead cam straight six). Mark also loved Jags, and this was a spare motor he had. So what better to power his hot rod?

So what the future holds for this, I don't know just yet. The plan is to sort the existing mechanics and then go from there. It has been sitting for probably two years and needs some mechanical freshening to make it at least drive again. Then lots and lots of bodywork and other stuff.

Right now, I am just feeling it out.

But it's a small world how what started as me watching TV on an afternoon in 2005 turned into this 17 years later, and I own on of the cars from Mark.

More to come on my project blog soon.

Godspeed Mark, and thank you Leslie, for letting me continue Mark's work.