Re: 1956 Clipper Deluxe

Posted by Brian Wilson On 2020/4/14 19:32:12

Dave

That's interesting. I thought car production stopped at the Packard plant in Detroit in June, 1956. My Clipper may have been built there - up to whatever stage they built export cars then. Where were the Packards built later in 1956 produced (ie post the merger with Studebaker)? Showing my ignorance!

I had assumed that June 1956 was the end of production for 1956 models.

At 9.5:1 the 352 engines maybe didn't need shims to lower the compression, although I seem to recall that the compression ratio on the V8 Caribbeans was 10:1. High for those days. Do you know if any V8 Caribbeans came to Australia new? They would have been hideously expensive here. Gas in Australia was quite good then, though. We had a thing called "Super" which was generally ok with higher compression/performance engines. Maybe equivalent to 95 octane unleaded now. But 10:1 would have been marginal with that. Probably needed to retard the ignition timing.

So your engines have the VN stamped at top/front of the block. I see why you're interested to know whether the Utica stamping is also at the rear on mine.

Will definitely check. I'm curious now, too!

Brian