It sure is, but they deserve it. After all Vietnam was a French rubber colony. And that is putting it kindly.

Well, if somehow the flow from the pump was completely blocked off it is possible for pump pressure to blow a hole in the crankcase. That can happen using heavy oils in very cold weather as well.

I would start by seeing if you can blow through the external plumbing that you modified. I don't know what kind of filter is on the engine, but they aren't supposed to flow backwards.

I know those coolers can be a problem, but usually after excessive oil pressure damage. I remember Billy Hirsch had a 34 Su8 and they thought that the higher the oil pressure the better and they blew the thing up with the resulting oil spraying out of the radiator cap.

The V-12 units are far more robust. Packard was learning.

If the plumbing is clear in the proper direction, the pump can be tested on the bench. Just pour some oil in it and start turning the shaft. It should spray out.

I too was shaking my head about that. Especially given there is another car in that batch that supposedly is a fake. When I read the circus verbiage I couldn't believe the garbage they made up.

At least they admitted the one Duesenberg is a fake. I guess that stuff is so well known you can't get away with it. Or perhaps Duesenberg owners have more class.

The crap these clowns are pulling is like something out of Herman Melville's worst nightmares.

If the happy possessor can find a seven passenger body he can return it to its original configuration. I'm sure he was getting the same treatment a customer gets at an art gallery after paying an exhorbidant price for a piece of phony art. Let's look at the most ridiculous part: A supposed Dietrich body with a built by Packard body plate mounted in the wrong location and crooked. That says it all as far as I'm concerned - It's crooked.

As well, Packard used high grade materials. Today they use cheap junk. We have a 2009 test vehicle with the spring mounts rotted off. Haven't looked at the frame yet. On my modern car I coated the lower control arms because they started looking like a barbeque at the weld points. The materials they use for disc brakes today are also junk. I remember when you could hang and bang pads over and over and not replace discs. Of course that is the only real alternative given new drums are not available.

We used to install turnbuckles although those doors are rather large and may require some special rigging.

Really no need for snide remarks here.

Unfortunately the parts book doesn't specify the dimensions, so I would address your concern by taking off a drum with the wheel bolted to it and checking the depth of penetration of your bolts. However, I think those are blind holes so that won't work. An alternative is to stick a piece of wire or something into the hole to measure the depth. Your concerns are well founded as for the earlier cars Packard had a multitude of part numbers for those bolts.

If you want to size a fastener you can fit the open end of a wrench over the thread to determine your specification. For example if a 9/16 wrench fits the threaded portion that is a 9/16 bolt. If you have a thread gauge or a thread file you can then determine the thread pitch. On a thread gauge it is a number, say 21, or if you take it to a hardware or auto store that has open fastener stock you can find out that way.

Metric works the same way. A 6mm X 1.mm metric fits a 6mm wrench on the shank and, say, a 10mm wrench on the hex.

1/4-20 will take a 1/4 inch open end wrench on the shank and a 7/16 wrench on the hex. The 20 is the number of threads per inch which you can also count with a ruler. I miss the old USS/SAE systems where everything is in 16ths of an inch. Metric always bugs me because I hate French imperialism.

If by Freewheeling you mean the car has overdrive then suspect the overrunning clutch. To test take it out of overdrive.

Nothing about that car is correct.

It's not even in the correct darn place.