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That’s great to hear, Bob. Congratulations on a successful outing. Hopefully, many more to follow.

Glad to hear that!

I'm pretty sure that diagram is for 1941 and later. The 1940 oil cap does not look like that.

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Went back to see if I could clean out the block some more. Pretty successful. I ended up going “fishing” with a magnet on a dowel rod to pull a lot of debris front he back of the block that wasn’t flushing out. Between that and blowing air and water from various directions (top hose, water inlet, heater valve and block drain cock) I was able get things moving around enough for the magnet to grab it.

I just kept at it until I couldn’t get any more.

Respectfully, absolutely do n o t change your differential. It is a blessing in disguise if you're installing overdrive. Many install the slightly taller, more long-legged ring and pinions from cars leaving the factory without overdrive in overdrive cars for still more relaxed cruising on today's highways. There were Hudson dealers out West whose service departments often did this after the war for those driving long trips on increasingly faster roads, and imagine this done at Packard service departments, too. It is hard to over-gear a Packard, unless you live in the mountains and travel with a pair of Sumo wrestlers. You can always downshift, but it's a real drag to "run out of gears."

As late as 1950, most manual shift automobiles retained trucky rear axle ratios because not having to downshift, doing most driving in third gear, was a mark of refinement to people born or who came of age when horse-drawn delivery wagons still shared the roads. When your Packard was built, we still had speed limits as low as 35, and 60 was really moving. To many people, a little snappier acceleration was more important than reducing sustained piston speed.

This is not encouraging you to cruise at 80 mph, because brakes that were good for 1950, even by early '60s standards, are no match for today's ABS four-wheel discs and more crowded roads full of cellphone nattering, texting, tweeting folks eating, drinking, putting on make up. Well adjusted drum brakes can stop you as fast as discs, but can fade if repeated fast stops on mountain roads.

The other advice above is what you need. Jeff Adkins, Moose Motors, Penngrove (Petaluma, CA in the North Bay) has everything you need. (707) 792-9985, packardguy54@sbcglobal.net
Please tell him a '47 Super Clipper in Walnut Creek referred you.

Extremely good work, and well worth the effort, because (as I'm sure you know) those wheels are unique to the Sport Models. There is no other choice than to repair them, other than to use incorrect wheels.

I admire you for painting the car in its original colors. I suspect that you'll really like the end results. There is no other Sport Model properly restored in the correct colors (that I know of). Steve Babinsky's car is the correct color, but because it is now 100 years old, it doesn't give you the proper idea of what it looked like new. I cannot wait to see your car finished.

Fantastic, way to go Ben, your tenacity really paid off!
Bob J.

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V-I-C-T-O-R-Y!!!!!!!! That was for sure a test of my patience. I thought I was going crazy a couple of times with that one.

OK, so it was a reversal of wires. I spoke with Gene at YnZ and talk to him about the IGN over the right bolt. He said yes, that indicates that is where the #6 wire goes (from the ignition) and the sending unit goes to the other. His instructions did say the reverse, but as he said that was not the first time they were incorrect.

So. 2 things left before she comes off the blocks.

1. Finish up gluing down the weather striping on the convertible top.
2. Front left turn signal needs a new wire, as the original had a cold solder.

Cheers
Ben

After applying the epoxy primer, the problem that I had previously described became clear in one place... sanding the rims instead of sandblasting or dipping them. In the area of the recess of the air valve, the layers of paint were difficult to sand down by hand. So I sandblasted this small part in my sandblasting cabin. It was now clearly visible how deep the rust scars were in the visible external surface. Filling this with spray filler and then sanding everything down again to achieve a smooth surface and prevent the paint layer from building up too thick would have required countless additional hours.

Karl

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