Haven't tried a little heat yet? The puller is a great deal, but I have seen those tappets crack from too much manhandling. Once I had to pull the cam out a of restored 19th series car because a tappet cracked after the motor was finished. Fortunately the place had an overhead gantry so I pulled the entire powerpack up towards the ceiling. You don't have to get it hot enough to glow, just hot enough for things to move a little.

Also, as regards setting the lifter preload I always used a dial caliper. That is my choice for accuracy, especially on the V-12 which is such a dillie to pull back apart.

Hot sulphuric acid is another way. It can be neutralized using baking soda. However, once metal rusts the surface area is increased exponentially and new rust will form that much faster. So a chromate dip or other coating is required to forestall further corrosion.

The early 9th series 4 speed is very musical especially in the aluminum case version.

The 7th series is the best and in the speedster you can wind 2nd all the way up to 55-60 mph.

The mother of all 7th series cars is Bill Hirsch's 745. That one is absolutely fantastic especially when barreling around urban areas. Bill used to drive it through the Lincoln and Holland tunnels in 2nd gear and with the gears bouncing off the walls it must have been something. The thing sounds like a fire engine.

I think the late John Cavalero put an aluminum case 4 spd in his 840 touring car and it sounded great. You could hear it all the way down the block.

My guess is it has a cracked block that can't be repaired.

Dear africapackard:

Loose pinion nuts are something I never see so I wonder just what caused the problem.

What the manual is talking about is Pinion Turning Torque to Rotate. That requires a special inlbs torque wrench and a special plate wrench to hold the flange.

The procedure is to carefully tighten the pinion nut until the torque required to keep the shaft turning is in the specified range. With the differential gears removed.

When servicing the pinion seal the minimum required is to remove both brake drums and preferably both axles and measure the Total Torque to Rotate using the inlbs wrench. Then reinstall the nut and very carefully tighten until the Total Torque to Rotate begins to increase above the starting point. That sets up the preload for the pinion bearings.

But given your situation has no starting point this is not possible so let me give you some specs from the DANA Axle manual which are similar to Packard except Packard didn't use Total Torque to Rotate. They used a dialed in differential preload method which I use today as well and requires some special tools.

Now Dana typically calls for Total Torque to Rotate of 7-11 inlbs above the Pinion Torque to Rotate for old bearings of 10-20 inlbs. So pull both axles and shoot for the 24 inlbs that Packard specified for new pinion bearings.

But be careful because if the differential is in the same shape as your pinion then you could go too far. If your differential is still noisey then it has probably been damaged.

As for threadlocker - blue should be fine, but red requires heat to remove.

Good luck with your car.

PS: this is all very technical and the common method is to just air wrench everything together and hope for the best.

Dear africapackard:

Is this a new problem or has the car only recently become roadworthy?

Those pinion seals start to leak when cars sit idle. I don't know why, but it happens to modern cars as well. People who buy modern cars and then stash them hoping to make a mint one day find out that the cars become junk from just sitting.

The real old stuff didn't use seals and they can sit for years with no obvious side effects.

If this is a new problem then recheck the axle end play. You should be able to carefully knock each axle against the thrust block and the get an audible sound when pulling hard on the brake drum. There should be no binding either. Those wheel bearings require grease as well. I made up a special on the car rear wheel bearing packer for cases where I took cars out on test drives and could hear the rear wheel bearings. It was a cheap way to avoid costly breakdowns on cars that saw little use.

Hope this helps

On the subject of fluid condition let me add this note pertaining to Mopar ATF+4

a) The red fluid color is from dye to distinguish it from other oils
b) Mopar ATF+4 and Mopar Power Steering Oil + 4 are the same product and interchangible
c) The color of the fluid may change to brown with use and color is not an indication of fluid condition
d) The odor of the fluid may change with use and is not an indication of the condition of the fluid

These are actual service guidelines from Chrysler. So aside from listed maintenance intervals the only recommendation to replace the fluid in a Chrysler is when the transmission is changed or if there are symptoms.

Now of course, modern transmissions have good filters. The Ultramatic doesn't and would benefit from an add on. But, once the car is parked for a week there is a alot of settlement which is probably why they seem more reliable today than when they were being driven all the time. I doubt that "modern fluids" have much to do with it.

"Life of the car" for transmission fluid means there is no required service interval. Just like sealed suspension parts and differential oil. The only time the fluid requires replacement is when the transmission is replaced.

But the manual for my modern car does list a service interval for towing and severe driving with high oil temperatues as per mountainous regions.

One thing about transmission oil is the additive "packages" keep changing. If an old transmission has good oil the clutches have been soaking in that oil.

I found with a couple of cases with cars taken out of long term storage that changing the oil in the transmission was not the thing to do. These were manual transmissions and they just didn't shift as well no matter what I tried. Even the exact oil specified by the original manual. Maybe the transmission and oil were both shot, but given new parts are not available in those cases fooling with the oil was a mistake.

Getting back on the original subject if an Ultramatic is having an intermittent direct drive lockup problem I think that switching to Type F might be the way to go. Supposedly Type F will run higher pressures than Dexron. Packard did specify friction modifiers in a 1956 TSB, but I think that was to address synchronous shift problems in Drive range.

Eventually these transmissions are going to need soft part modifications to compensate for worn surfaces the same way as a modern car.

Dear rhl:

Those grilles have always been tough because the objective was to sell new cars and have them traded after five years.

You have a few choices:

One is to find someone doing spray silver which is shiny like chrome, but purely decorative (not easy).

Another, is to just buff your grille using rouge (available from paint suppliers and McMaster Carr) You will need some body shop equipment as well.

Another choice is have the platers strip the chrome and polish the zinc casting, then immediately take it to a body shop and have them clear coat it.

I know someone who passed out when they priced chroming a 55 Studebaker grille so they painted it body tone. The darn thing looked better.

Dear Wesley:

With these old motors it's a good idea to start with carburetor cleaner and penetrating oil for a week to let everything soak.

Given the plunger is what is holding hydraulic pressure those stuck lifters are toast.

I have seen those tappets crack and cause collapsed lifters as well, so if your car has been suffering from sticky valves then clean the tappets out with brake parts cleaner and compressed air (if available) and make a thorough inspection.

Soak the stuck lifters and try carefully heating the tappet. (turn the motor to raise the tappet to open)

They might even blow apart so wear goggles.

Hope this helps.