Re: "Waking Sleeping Beauty"

Posted by Jim L. in OR On 2010/12/29 16:58:29

Thanks Howard, I noticed that when I went to the '56 diagram for guidance - needless to say I got even more confused.
The main reason I'm making a bit of a mountain out of this is that the car suddenly died on the owners before last and never ran again which is why it sat in a garage for 25 years. The guy I bought it from bought a lot a parts for it but never had the chance to work on it.
One of my guesses I made when I saw the Amp gauge was that someone changed polarity and the coil didn't like it. That would explain its sudden death on the freeway. I checked the coil today to see what was hooked to + or - but, as (my) luck would have it, the terminals were identified as "Bat" & "Dist" so that ended that bright idea. From what Craig says, it DOES sound like the car was switched - I'm just not sure if the job was done all the way through.
As far as the voltage regulator goes, it looks like the Senior Packards used the same basic regulator both years though the numbers are different. The FSM showed me you can't mix a Clipper Regulator with a Senior but given that the wiring diagrams weren't changed between between years to show the difference in polarity I'm not sure how far to trust them.
I guess the thing to do is what Craig and Howard suggest and turn the battery around and see if that makes the gauge work the right way.
My thanks to both of you for your help on this!