Re: Men bet their lives on it - the Packard-built Merlin V-12

Posted by Packard5687 On 2017/3/29 22:51:55

<i>"The Perfect Storm of all those reasons for Packard's demise could not have been more complicated. No wonder we're still talking about it sixty years later. But remember, 72 years ago men bet their lives on it.</i>"

Indeed! It was an amazing series of events. I have long been of the opinion that Packard would have pulled out of it but for the loss of those defense contracts. I think that had the contracts not been yanked, Nance would have received funding for the '57s. It's such a shame that they came so close to pulling it off but were forced to close. I've always wondered why they didn't negotiate retention of the engine and transmission building at Utica as part of the Curtiss-Wright deal. Studebaker would have been much more competitive with the easily expandable Packard V-8. The Studebaker V-8 was a great little engine, but that was its problem: it was little. The bore centers were too close for safe expansion beyond 289 cubic inches. OTOH, the Packard V-8 for '57 would have been 440 cubic inches. I've never seen anything that indicated that they tried to get the concession from Curtiss-Wright to continue engine production at Utica.