This evening I decided to take a look at the ignition points.....I rotated the engine by hand untill the points were open and they were barely opening. Looking at the spec, the point gap should be 0.016". My one quick check with a feeler gauge looked like it was .008 or less. it could even be .005.
I went through the distributor in october of 2022, and only about 2000 miles ago. That seems like not a long time for the point gap to close up.
I will take out the points and file them with a point file, then re-set the gap and adjust dwell and timing. I'll also apply some distributor grease to the 8 sided cam that opens the points...
2000 miles seems like a very short service interval for points. What can cause them to wear fast? I guess the rubbing block would have to be the main culprit right?

Oh, and we have a choice between 5% or 10% ethanol gas here in Germany. I use the 5%, and have not had any real problems with it.

Last week was great weather here in Germany, so I finished the windows and was able to drive to work on Friday. On the way home I have a pretty long uphill section which is about 1 mile after starting the car. Ambient temps were in the 60s, and so things were already kind of warmed up, but not totally warmed up. While going uphill, I was losing power and getting a miss....when the car was warmed up, it was better, but not completely gone. Accelerating up through the gears hard on the gas on a flat surface was OK, but getting far into the gas pedal while trying to go up hill was resulting in hesitation and loss of power....
Granted, this is the beginning of the season, and the Gas is a few months old, but I was not happy about the performance... Not sure what it could be or what to check. I will go over the ignition system to make sure I don't see any problems there. It could be choke adjustment, or the fuel pump not keeping up with the fuel demand when going uphill?
Fuel tank is new, fuel pump is also rebuilt a few years ago, Carb was rebuilt by Daytona, I went through the ignition system once, but that was two years ago. Could be the old "fuel cap not vented properly" trick?
Driving at light throttle when the family was on board was ok. When driving alone, and I start to use the four barrel carb, that is when she was not giving me full power. Could be weak spark when the mixture gets rich at high load? Ignition system is points, rotor is non-resistor type, solid core packard wires, and Autolite A308 resistor plugs.....
This week is rainy, so it might be a few days before I am on the road again to test things. Any speculation and suggestions from our collective knowledge?

Hey Kevin,
On my Caribbean I had a crushed steel brake line on the rear axle between the right rear wheel cylinder and the junction block on the rear axle. If you haven't already done so, you might want to look over all your steel brake lines to make sure no tow truck driver crushed a brake line when chaining the car down during towing/transport. -Maybe you already did that, but it can't hurt to make sure all your steel lines are healthy. Seeing as how our cars have a single brake circuit, and no low fluid warning lights. Good work so far!

The picture in post 417 was my starting point before I adjusted things. Those two bolts with the lock nuts were the First thing I corrected.
I may try and push the whole rear window 1/8 inch rearwards, or the front window a scooch forwards to allow the front edge of the rear window to be more vertical when rolled up.

Thank you very much Howard. I messed around with the rear window, loosening the two bolts and the screw that hold the pivot to the B pillar area, but could not make much improvement. I tried that for a while, and then decided to mess around with the front window. I do have the two plugs that allow me to get to those areas you circled....I messed around with that, and still have about 1/4 in mis-alignment with the bottom of the window.
The last thing I did was pull the interior door panel off the driver's door. I will install new window run fuzzies in the front window, and also give that a good service and hopefully a good adjust and align.
I will also read the 55-56 body section again, I read in Kevin's Panama blog about him adjusting his windows and he mentioned that the newer manual has a better description.
I guess these are the details that take time...

This evening I cleaned the tracks for the rear Windows and adjusted the up and down stops so they fit pretty well in the full up and down positions. You can see what I was starting with on this picture taken from the inside.
On the one picture taken from the outside of the car, you can see that the bottom of the rear window does not really align with the window on the drivers door. Is there a way to adjust this? Do I adjust the front or the rear window? It is almost like the bottom front corner of the rrar window should adjust more outboard. The top of the window aligns pretty well. The passenger side is also better than the drivers side.
I found a few loose screws and a missing bolt, so tightening everything up, and with a clean and lube the Windows are easier to roll up and down. My girls will like it.

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The 4$ breaker from amazon is at my sister's, and I'll install it in April.
My windlace was looking tired after 70 some years of service, so I am replacing that. The stuff that looks old I want to keep, but the stuff that looks trashed I want to replace. While I am in there I will clean and adjust the rear window tracks and stops, and also re-seal the weather barrier and put in some dynamat sound stuff. The original weather barrier looks pretty schriveled up. Getting the windows freed up, and properly adjusted will be another NVH improvement.

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I recently used www.lemonsquad.com for a ppi on a 1985 Mustang SVO. They made a nice 115 page report of the car with tons of pictures. -Certianly they won't be packard experts, but they can be "local boots on the ground" for you to look at a car.

Thanks Howard,
I will look to see if I can find something like that here, or send one to my sister in Veromnt who will visit me in April. -I found something on ebay, but it comes directly from China. I can't buy that....I also measured my voltage drop with this new wiring at 165 millivolts. With a failing switch and dirty connecters I originally had a 1.6 volt voltage drop. After putting new switches and cleaning all contacts I got down to 300 mV drop. So the headlights will be much brighter now. -I just have to make everything as safe, or safer as OEM by protecting that hot side wiring.

Great Score Kevin! When you get things sorted out, I will be curious to hear your report about how different that car is to the 54! -driveline and suspension and all....