Re: Various CL Pickings

Posted by HH56 On 2017/10/15 11:06:05

Quote:
I don't believe it was ever an official Packard accessory but if the car was bought in a dry climate state -- anywhere swamp coolers will work -- I'd be willing to bet a Packard dealer would have had one to sell. I grew up in New Mexico and those things were available all over the southwest just about anywhere car parts were sold.

Father bought one of the window jobs and it was better than nothing on a long trip. A sustained speed did provide a bit of cool air flowing thru the unit. They needed to be periodically refilled and did have their disadvantages. One was you had to be careful when opening and closing the door.

Then there is the second disadvantage. The pad is on a cylinder and has to be periodically rewetted which is done by pulling a cord. That action rotates the pad thru the water reservoir. NEVER NEVER pull the cord fast to rewet the pad while the car is going down the road. Forced air + saturated pad = instant bath.

Another version is the type that sits over the transmission hump. Fill the reservoir, turn it on and a nice cool breeze would blow out until the car got really humid inside and then it basically stopped working. The better version was one that used frozen containers filled with some slow thawing chemical which you could freeze at home and then exchange periodically at service stations along the way. Those fit on metal shelves with fins the air blew thru and would last an hour or so. During the trip you could trade your thawed containers and a few cents for some already frozen cans which would last until you got to the next exchange place. Downside was if no exchange places were available you fell back to the 6-60 cooling system and suffered along with everyone else.