I have decided to press my 288 L8 into service and I am hoping to keep it a fairly low budget build up (unlike my 52 327). I'm planning to build my own intake manifold and do a good rebuild on the engine and do something fancy to the exhaust and if i can find someone who will touch it regrind the cam. I'm wondering if anyone has made a custom intake for the L8 before and what their experience was I want more of a hot rod look than the stock 4bbl and the original Edmunds 2X2 is out of the budget for this build any help would be great.

In my experience the solid core wires work best with old points ignitions, you want to stay away from the MSD style which i believe are graphite core wires (when you cut them there black inside not copper colored) and are designed for 12V electronic systems. You can get cloth covered wires from several sources its as simple as a Google search, however my personal favorites are the clear red "Raja" style like you would find on a 1950's hot rod you can buy them from moon in bulk length and you have several different plug ends to chose from if you type mooneyesusa.com into your browser you'll find them.

Does any one know if say a Hudson 6 lifter could be used or are the sizes all wrong?

I would love to see your car when its done! And please share the info you have on it I'm very interested. Correct me if I'm wrong but didn't the article say he made some of the body panels out of aluminum? It's a wonder any car survived what they put them through during that race and i would love to see it on display. I was kicking around the idea of one day cloning it but it looks like you beat me to the punch. Good luck!

No problem it took me a sec and a couple times reading through the article to wrap my head around that being a cut down Packard 200. I wish it was that easy to get a a hot cam these days!

Pistons, rods, cam, crank, drive shaft

I found this link on Google when I was searching for racing Packards there is not much on the engine but i thought it was pretty cool
http://lacarrera2007.blogspot.com/2011/07/morning-qualifying-whatsa-motto-you.html

I have a buddy that may have one but I would have to check with him. It would be a rebuildable core. If your handy with a welder you could fab a 2x2 manifold from aluminum or steel, it would look very traditional and would take a little of weight off a very heavy engine.

Another advantage of an aluminum head is the ability to weld it if needed if you would like to polish the combustion chamber or weld it to reconfigure it or allow for bigger valves of a higher lift cam

Joe Hunt cam custom build a magneto for pretty much any application they quoted me $800 about a year ago for my 327, but it wont be hidden by any means but they are a good part. If you have switched to 12V ignition Pertronix has an electronic conversion that replaces your points all together and i have heard there quite good but i can't say for sure if they will work on a packard.