Re: 55 Electrics

Posted by PJ On 2009/7/17 7:18:14

I sent my 55 Patrician's torsion control unit to Snoqualmie, WA for conversion to solid state electronics. My mechanic has put it back into car but informs me that when the three wires are plugged into the proper sockets for a 1955 the system is dead. The contol unit has extra poles apparently for the 1956 models. My mechanic says that it appears to him that the 1956 arrangement calls for the use of as many as six wires. Also, when he plugs the three wires from
the wiring harness to control unit into some of these other poles the system is hot and partially operates to adjust the level of the car. What I am wondering
is whether the rebuilder in Snoqualmie may have rewired the control unit for a 1956 Packard even though my transmittal letter clearly indicated that the
car was a 1955. I would appreciate any advice and help on this problem.


Here are some additional facts to add to this puzzle. Our car is an end of the model year car, which my
father and I picked up in Chicago when the 1956's were already on the showroom floor. I have reason
to believe, then, that the control unit for our car's torsion bar system was a 1956 control unit which the
factory cobbled to take the wiring from the 1955 harness (When my mechanic recently pulled the
control unit off of the car, he found that the three wires coming out of the unit were differently
colored than the three wires coming to the unit from the harness). My surmise, then, is that the
control unit on 1956's is wired differently than a 1955's control unit. So that when I told Snoqualmie that I
had a 1955 Packard, they naturally gave me back a solid state 1955 unit instead of the 1956
that I possible needed because of the aforemenitioned end of the model year swap at the
factory. If this is true, then, is it possible for me to hook up the three wires from the wiring
harness to a 1956 control unit? As I noted in the original comment, the motor is coming on
and moving the short torsion bars when the three wires are run to other terminals in the
unit than the three terminals to which they were hooked when the unit was taken out
of the car. I am thinking this problem might all go away if I obtain another control unit
from a salvaged car, send it to Snoqualmie and have them re-wire the unit to be a
1956 solid state unit, and, then, hook it up as the original unit was hooked up when
it came off of the car. [Remember, my mechanic says that he read the shop manual
and that it says that the 1956's have as many as six wires from the harness to the control
unit].