I have to be amused by the statement where you hired someone to add 6 inches to your garage. I was in a similar situation. The Packard fit just fine in my early 70s built condo garage but when I moved to the current house built in the early 50s, not only was the car too long, the garage was too narrow. The only way to get the car in was hug the right side wall, drive till the front was against that wall and then try to squeeze out the door. The garage door came down and missed the rear bumper by an inch. That was with a 56 Patrician. Probably never would have got out of a long door hardtop.
My solution was to build a 3 car garage which I thought would have enough space to last a lifetime. Wrong! With the sizes of our garages, kind of makes you wonder what others did when buying a large 50s car back in the day.
In all probability the diaphragms in the co-ordinator valve section of the washer have deteriorated for starts -- probably the piston rings are not in great shape either. There needs to be water flowing past the diaphragms in the valve to apply and stop the vacuum to the co-ordinator so the wiper motor will start and stop..
Kev wrote an excellent how to on rebuilding the unit. Kits should still be available from McVey Cadillac parts or IIRC, Tucson Packard had them too and may still do rebuilds if you don't want to tackle it yourself.
https://www.packardinfo.com/xoops/html/downloads/Rebuilding%20a%20Trico%20Washer.pdf If you can't find a good NOS or used speedo cable many have used the universal kits. Just a matter of cutting the cable to length and installing the correct tip out of several that comes with the kit on the end before sliding the new cable back in the original housing.
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