Quote:
HH56 wrote:
I believe he is referring to the weatherstrips used on the hardtops above the door windows. Because they flip up for clearance when the door opens and down to cover the gap when the door closes I have often heard those items called flippers. I believe their official name is Weatherstrips, hinge type, and listed in parts book in group 30.344.
I don't know of anyone in the Packard world who mentions repairs but Tucson Packards does seem to repair a lot of items no one else offers services for so maybe worth a phone call to them. I seem to recall reading that the same weatherstrips or at least a very similar item was also used on some GM cars in that era. Maybe one of their vendors would be a possibility or might know of someone.
Okay. So many new names are being made up these days that I can't keep up with it all. We used to call these gadgets "door flaps" or "hardtop door flaps."
Yes, GM absolutely DID use spring-hinged stainless weatherstrips that "flipped" back and forth with door opening and closing. Just like Packard's versions.
Rather than repairing these pieces, it might be far easier (and cheaper) to simply start buying up a few sets off of the many sitting parts cars around the country. These parts were the same for Packard hardtops whether they be Four Hundreds or Caribbeans. The few I've ever seen failed were usually due to never being lubricated or a spring giving out (or both).
As for the term "flipper"... In the 1940s and 1950s around Detroit, when people said "flippers" they meant bars or blades or spinners or anything attached to wheel covers that glinted in the sunlight and appeared to be "flipping" as the car drove along. Some rodders and customizers back then actually used to hammer out wheelcovers so that the caps poked welll out from the wheels and then attached Oldsmobile or Dodge spinners to them. Some even went to the hardware store and bought chrome drawer pull handles and screwed those onto wheel covers. These were all generically known (at least in those days) as "flippers."
Even the 1959 Cadillac Cyclone concept car had bright shining thin bars added to the wheels and people around Detroit back then called these "flippers" too. And then there was this dolphin...
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