I have on order a set of Diamondback Auburn Premium 235/75R15 WW with the beauty bar for my '48 Custom (pic left) to replace the aging Denman L78-15 WW bias ply. (The Denman's have the beauty bar too.) I'll let you know how it goes. I'm expecting the biggest issue will be getting them into the rear wheel wells. The Denman's are a tight fit. Fortunately I have a frame lift so the axle can hang, without having to resort to a bumper jack.

As for my '55 400, being more of a regular driver, I went with standard 235/75R15 Hankook Kinergy ST radial blackwall from our local tire shop and they have worked great, at a fraction of the price. No problem getting them in/out of the wheel well.

10w-30 is ideal for a motor that isn't worn.

That video shows a ball retainer. I don't think the carb on the Packard has a ball retainer. If it's supposed to then I'm probably missing that too.

Quote:

PM sent 2/28.

Drum brakes will stop a car just as effectively as disc brakes -- often even more so. Why more so? Because the braking surface area of drum brakes is much higher and drum brakes are self-energizing, meaning the rotational force on the leading shoe applies pressure to the trailing shoe, providing a mechanical power braking increasing the braking force with less pedal pressure (and why the trailing shoe is bigger than the leading, to equalize the shoe to drum pressure). Disc brakes are not self-energizing and rely on booster systems (vacuum, electric) to increase pressure. Lose that booster system which often relies on the engine running and you've lost your ability to brake. The advantages of disc brakes is they tend to cool faster and more critically don't heat up the brake fluid as much because there's no hydraulic cylinder inside the drum but is instead external in the open air. Secondarily, they inherently self-adjust without the need of mechanical adjusters so generally require less maintenance between replacements (though do wear out faster requiring more frequent replacement).

So the bottom line is that drum brakes have some significant advantages over disc brakes but the one issue of greatest concern regarding drum brakes is that of the boiling point of the hydraulic fluid. Once liquid turns to vapor in a hydraulic system you've lost the incompressibility of that fluid, meaning the pedal goes to the floor with virtually no actual braking. DOT3/4 boils at 401F/450F when dry, but it does absorb moisture. Wet, you'll get boiling at 284F/311F. The very incompatible DOT5 does not absorb moisture and boils at 500F, but is prone to entraining air so is difficult to bleed and thereby tends to have a spongy feel. The newest, and compatible with DOT 3/4, DOT 5.1 does again absorb moisture but boils at 500F dry and 356F wet.

So you can see with the wide swing between dry/wet boiling points that the problem with drum brakes is mostly due to neglect, i.e., lack of proper maintenance. With all these facts, my general recommendation for an otherwise sound system is to flush the brake fluid out of the system with fresh DOT5.1 (or at least fresh DOT4). It's an inexpensive yet huge upgrade. For a daily driver whenever shoes are replaced (at a minimum) replace all the fluid -- more frequently the less the car is driven. With this one simple change the boiling point can go from 284F to 500F! With the danger of fade thus mitigated, with no sponginess, you get all the advantages of drum brakes and no huge expense of a disc brake conversion. Another useful upgrade is a larger fluid reservoir ideally with a bladder to isolate it from the air which will help a great deal with keeping that moisture out. I installed a remote reservoir on my '55. They were sold back then as an aftermarket accessory so are actually period correct.

Drum brakes need to be adjusted properly which requires some expertise, with the pivot pin centering the shoes and the adjusters taking up the slack. Adjusters require periodic readjustment until shoes are worn out and replaced unless self-adjusters are present (they adjust when braking in reverse). Disc brakes are for dummies, as the expression goes. There's not much to them other than to properly lubricate the pins they float on.

Keep in mind also that a conversion requires a lot of engineering expertise to get the front/rear braking forces balanced properly. Front discs paired with the original rear drums has challenging compromises to deal with and you may find stopping distances (and safety) actually worse than with the original brakes.

With the original drum brakes the braking force can be easily proportioned front to rear by varying the wheel cylinder piston size to a small degree (generally about an eighth of an inch), which is what exists originally. When you mix a disc front with an existing drum rear those ratios are way off as they can't control the existing rear and the front calipers are off the shelf for a range of vehicles. The typically applied solution is a proportioning valve to try to compensate for the mismatch. Those valves complicate bleeding and are another source of failure, and again are off the shelf items that often don't get the proportioning quite right between front and rear resulting in less effective braking.

Fun fact: You don't often see disc brakes on semi-tractor rigs, which have much higher braking requirements due to their loads, but they avoid the boiling hydraulic fluid issue by using compressed air. Otherwise they retain the advantages of drum brakes. (My prediction is that when the big rigs go electric with regenerative braking you'll then see them finally move to disc brakes and abandon the whole air compressor thing for simplicity and compactness.)

Re: '55 400
My accelerator pump isn't really working. The plunger itself is fine but I suspect there is supposed to be a check ball and there does not appear to be one. Someone may have lost it in the past. Anyone have an exploded view of the carb or can fill me in on where I may obtain the right size check ball if I'm correct.

I would not be interested in full wire wheels -- too much work to keep them clean and they tend to not be as solid. I would be interested in picking up a set of wire wheel covers if an affordable opportunity arose but I suspect they're rather rare.

One thing I'm curious about is what they did in the way of oil changes, which is normally rather time consuming. Oil wasn't very good in those days so I rather doubt they went the full mileage just topping it off but I suppose they could have.

Another thing absent from the film is they never showed the broken windshield, which tells me they weren't actually filming the real test (which had a collision with a pheasant), but must have done some "acting" for the film before or after the actual testing. As I recall part of a publicity tour included the broken windshield with a sign explaining what happened so I don't think the windshield was replaced right away. This is reinforced by the rather wooden dialog by the non-actors.

Would someone please educate me on what was offered in the way of wire wheel covers (vs wire rims) on the '55-'56 senior cars. Were they an available option? Rarity? Have they ever been reproduced?

On it's way to Arthur Gould. Thanks.

Quote: