Just pulled the aero-drive cable out of the '41 as it was stuck, and that's being taken care of. But there are two things I'd like some advice on please.

1) The pictures below show the end of the cable where it connects to the aero-drive. The hard outer tube at the point where it joins the flexible cable sheathing has a fitting that clamps it to the gearbox support. Actually this is a double barreled question
- a) Should the hard outer tube be part of the fitting that clamps to the car because on this one it is not although it looks like it could/should be?
- b)And this one also has a slight kink where it meets the fitting - I presume this should be straight?

2) My cable does not have a knob at the dashboard end - where can I obtain the right knob please?

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Monday 7th April 2008

Down to the workshop early and into removing the right front fender. This necessitated removal of the lower panel in front of the radiator to gain access to the bolts holding the front of the fender to the right side grill panel. What a fiasco! Helped in no small part by my POR-15 effort last Saturday as the threads for these bolts, which weren't standard were filled with the stuff. Finally had to gain Wade's assistance to break or remove these as the case may be. Removal of the rest of the bolts and bolts and nuts was fairly straight-forward except at one stage about half seemed to be breaking rather than undoing! Wasn't a worry, as they will be replaced anyway, until I got to the studs and nuts holding the rear of the guard to the body. Managed to snap the lower 2 and only the upper 2 came out relatively easily. With the fender removed it was easier to see and access the rust area and there was also some surface rust where fender and body met. But at least all's clear for Cablan to do the rust repair.

Next was starting the re-assembly of the front end. Only one side has been dis-assembled leaving the other as a template to guide us as to how it look's when finished. First up was cleaning up excess POR-15 from the mating surfaces of the stub axle and the suspension upright. Then cleaning the king pin, the needle bearings, and the thrust bearing before pressing the needle bearings into the stub axle. Then lubing the bearings before a trial fin with the king pin. All well so far but, there weren't enough shims provided in the kit so Wade went around to the brake guy who said "Lucky you came along, I was going to toss that old box of shims". So to cut a long story short, Wade now has a good supply of different thickness shims for future Packard work. So between the shims we had and the new supply the problem was overcome.

While Wade went round to the brake guy, and I'll come back to the brake guy a little later, I went under the '41 again, this time to remove the aero-drive cable because it was frozen up and wouldn't move. Thought I was going well until I found the cable I had removed had a gear drive on it when I removed it from the O/D! O/D could mean Oh Dear or Oh Damn or somesuch but in my case it obviously means Old & Dumb. Anyway, replaced the speedo cable then found the O/D cable and verified it was for the aero-drive and proceeded to undo the clevis pin connecting it to the arm on the O/D, then undid the bracket where it clamps to the gearbox mount.

Back to re-assembly of the king pins, and after damaging one shim because of too tight a fit, the stub axle and upright assembly was together and requiring pressing of the cotter pin in the stub axle. Until at the press we saw that the stub axle was on upside down! Fortunately this was before the pin was pressed so it was a matter of re-assembling it right side up. Easy to see how it happened as there were numerous fitting exercises before the final assembly. Then to the caps over the ends of the pin. These were a little too wide so to reduce the diameter Wade pressed a small socket on the inside of the cap while a larger socket took the force around the edge of the cap and it worked a treat!

Next was to be reaming of the bushes pressed into the lower support arm a couple of months ago then pressing the pin into the upright and lower support arm. But! Wade on examination found the bushes used to be too long as they didn't leave any room for the end caps to be inserted. So, the bushes were pushed out, and after a series of measurements it was decided to have about 0.175" machined from the length of each bushing.

Again, this time while Wade went round o the machine shop I was back to the '41 to finish up removal of the O/D cable. Finally retrieved the cable by pushing it through the firewall. When Wade returned he advised the machining would be done tomorrow. So we turned to the O/D cable and after Wade removed the activation switch and a little oil was added to the cable through the switch mount - movement was obtained! This was repeated a number of times and the cable will be left for the oil to work it's way through the length of the cable aided by gravity and periodic oil top-ups.

But back to the brake guy. Turns out he was doing some work on Ed's(another bloke in our Packard Club) '37 120 Sedan and on backing it out managed to scrape one of the front fenders as the guy guiding him said he had clearance issues one side so he apparently over compensated on the other side! Naturally Ed's not happy, but I believe the situation will be rectified to Ed's satisfaction.

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to the site Brian, plenty of experienced and knowledgeable Packard people here who are willing to help. Unfortunately my mechanical expertise is very limited so I can't offer a suggestion to help but I'm sure there are others who will. Could you please add your '51 to the Owner Registry, including a pic, and known history, if you haven't already done so?

I envy you guys and girl's, in Eric's case at least. Missed last year by a week but went to the Museum anyway while I was in the US. I will try to get there again one of these years as I intend to get back to the US. To then be able to meet and greet some of the wonderful people here on Packardinfo would be fantastic. In the meantime, enjoy Warren with those who get there and sink one for me.

Saturday 5th April 2008

Spent the morning at the workshop. First cleaned the floor under the '41 from all the droppings of the last few weeks. Then, with the compressed air gun, blew all the extra metal ready dust out, then wiped over those areas still showing excess metal ready and blew over them again.

Next was the moment I been waiting for. Painting! But first, after the previous fiasco where more POR-15 ended up on me than on the '41 some time was spent with a plan of attack formed. Also because of my proximity to freshly painted surfaces in a tight environment and my penchant for wearing shorts and short sleeved shirts I fabricated a pair of "arm protectors" out of a pair of socks! These covered my arms from the rubber gloves to my shirt sleeve, or so I thought, as the left sleeve rode up and I've got the daubs to show for it. Nevertheless it was a vast improvement from the last time round although the right knee also has it's share of paint on it too. So spent the next 2&1/2 hours ducking and weaving, on and off the creeper, to get the best angles to apply the POR-15. No doubt, when I get back to the workshop om Monday, there will be plenty of places needing touch up. Would have posted a pic, but camera batteries were dead, will do so on Monday.

And while I was painting Wade brought in Cablan. the old guy who didn't trust his sons to do it, to look at the rust issue. Cablan says he can fix it, but first I need to remove the right front fender so he has better access. He is going to fabricate a new piece of metal then cut out the rusted metal, and then MIG weld in the new piece. And when I asked him "how much" he said don't worry about it! At least I'll have to get him his drink of choice as I'm sure he'll have a dry throat by the time he's through.

Thanks everyone for your input and advice. Now have to make a decision as to which way to go.

Again

Thursday 3rd April 2008

Only spent the morning at the workshop. Arrived to find Barry Smith, he of the '51 Convertible that arrived at the same times as the '41. Barry was down from Tamworth, about 300 miles north-west from Sydney, and along with some other smaller matters was picking up the grill for the '51 which he had re-chromed. Wade arrived soon after and Barry proceeded to bring us up to date on progress on the '51. The next major process is Barry's renewing of the passenger and boot compartment floors. Before Barry left I got the details of the Sydney plater he used and will use him in lieu of the Newcastle, 100 miles north, one I had contemplated using.

After Barry left it was into the '41 with the front frame, engine, etc metal readied and washed down. On Saturday will POR-15 these and then the following week we should be right to start re-assembly of the front end.

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Dave,

One thing I didn't mention in my original post is that the plate is marked "DYNA-FLYTE", so is this an aftermarket item? Because when Eric came up with the reference of "1947-52 Packards 2200,2300,200,250,300 w/dist #1110811&25" I didn't think further about that marking.

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John,

You got me!

Only trouble was April Fools had already passed here because of the time difference,

Earlier today, Wade the mate helping me with my '41 120 Coupe, told me the distributor I had removed from the car has dual points! On checking, it was a Delco-Remy 1110811 9J19. Then followed a search of the manuals and parts books we had, which advised that '41 120's had a single point Autolite distributor. Couldn't find any mention of dual points but our reference material petered out about 46/47.

In the Chat Room later I mentioned this to Eric (Turbopackman) and although he didn't know off-hand he soon came up with an answer "1947-52 Packards 2200,2300,200,250,300 w/dist #1110811&25".

So it seems later post-war dual point distributors fit the pre-war 120 engines!

I've still got a question even though my original query was answered before it even made it to this Forum. The question being, is there any advantage to having the dual points?

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