Re: Leaded fuel

Posted by su8overdrive On 2023/11/7 21:03:29

Right. Ethanol gas is a net energy consumer, unless it's produced from agwaste as in Brazil and as Henry Ford intended his Model T and Fordson tractor, comprising half the vehicles on the world's roads and fields by 1920. Al Gore and other former proponents long since admit ethanol gas from corn a boondoggle, and regardless of source, lower in BTUs than straight gas, with the attendant hydroscopic malady.

If you can get straight gas, incrementally more power to you. Meanwhile, avgas is no better than auto gas, but some guys like the sound of it; marketing takes advantage of unrequited testosterone.
Long ago, when i was young and under the apple bough, I filled up my then '40 120 at an area airport where a couple friends flew everything from a '74 Cessna 180 Sky Wagon tail dragger, '56 Twin Beech, a pair of P-51s; one R-R Merlined and t'other Packard Merlined and no, they didn't "sound" different and there was no, repeat n o, difference 'twixt them series by series other than the Brit built version having nicer external hand finishing; and one of only 18 P-40s then flying in the world.

My Packard felt not a trace improved while i felt like a jerk adding that much more lead into the fragile environment we all share. So much for my One-Twenty's owner's manual suggesting other motorists look to Packard drivers as setting an example of responsible and safe driving.

Again, Big Kev, above, simply sums it.

Blake, see if there's an existing port/plug on your intake manifold. My '47 Super delivered w/ Electromatic which i had rebuilt and worked as intended, but i disliked the robotic aspect and that your clutch pedal depressed at long lights, doing your throw out bearing no favors, a concern far from Packard's mind as they were then, as Dutch Darrin observed in late '39/'40, "so afraid of GM they couldn't see straight," not just because of the racy new GM C body but HydraMatic. In fact, Packard even ran ads suggesting those in city traffic might all day long leave their car in second gear w/ OD engaged for a de facto automatic transmission, certainly no good for your pressure plate, especially in Pittsburgh or San Francisco.

But Packard was fast fading and got their second stay of execution thanks to fat war contracts (1935's 120 their first stay), the Merlin agreement rewritten by their legal counsel, Henry E. Bodman, the guide for government contracts for years to come, and here we are today w/ the $1.5 trillion w/ a T F-35 contractors' feeding frenzy, enough to erase a l l our nation's student loans.

So i removed it and plumbed my Ampco/Vaco top oiler into that existing vacuum orifice (pictured, previous post this thread). Adjust so you use a quart of Marvel every 1,000 to 1,200 miles and you'll be okay. As mentioned, a late friend, as a very young '37 Willys coupe- and occasionally supercharged '37 Cord Phaeton-driving wrench during War II --there was never a gas shortage, witness the PT boats gas-engined for simplified logistics, such gas hogs they oft had to be towed back to base by destroyers after sortees, the German Diesel Schnellboots superior and faster, fine as the PT's mahogany woodwork was -- at the Alameda Naval Air Station said Pan Am's chief of maintenance swore by Marvel, ordered it by the 55-gallon drum. Any trouble w/ those big 18-cylinder Pratt & Whitney Wasps and Wright Cyclones meant a long, wet walk home.

So your missing plate nice, but mightn't be needed.