Dave and all,
The car I found some time ago, and it is in my full 22nd-23rd roster as well as my 22nd-23rd BSN roster so I don't know why you got missed Dave, just fell through the cracks somewhere I guess, is 2352-1 Briggs 2352-102 BSN 814340. The car was sold through Packard's New York agency to a Swedish dual citizen who shipped it to Sweden for his driving car while there. He alternated back and forth each year. The car is currently being restored by his nephue. During restoration all kinds of special part tags etc were found under seats and behind upholstery so there is virtually no doubt it served as a prototype Its BSN is only 36 numbers below that of 2252-5706 and would indicate it was pulled off the line in July of 1948. It has an early type 22nd Series VIN plate.

Note the 5479-1 also has a 26th Series VIN plate.

This car should certainly be preserved and restored as it is historically significant. I will be that a lot of early features and special tags will show up during restoration.

Robert Neal

By the way, I successfuly cut and pasted the images.

I own a 1954 Cavalier so I measured the door widths. They should be the same as 1951-53. They did change the shape of the rear fender front bulge but the door width should be the same. Flat edge to flat edge is 39 1/2 front door, 37 1/8 rear door.

Robert Neal

I am certainly following this with great interest. Particularly since there seem to be some of you who have better image scaling abilities than I do. The image Owen just posted, by the way, is flipped horizontally, unless that was a RHD car. Not that it makes any difference in measuring, etc. Somewhere along the way years ago the photo was printed with the negative reversed. Image programs, of course, can flip it with the push of the button.

I have hard copies of all the Packard board minutes from about 1941 to the end and I have never seen a mention of this or any of the Derham or Dietrich cars, but I will check again.

Robert Neal

The picture you linked to is at the Chicago auto show on 2/17 to 24/51, which is right at announcement of the availability of the Mayfair and convertible. The Mayfair and convertible both have 4 holes. The 3 hole car is the Patrician, which always had 3 for 1951. Someone recently reported a Patrician with 4 to me, but Packard pushed them as accessory items to put on any model if desired. Thus one needs to be careful. Proper spacing might be the clue as to whether a fourth was added or original.

Robert
RJNeal0000@aol.com

Big Kev - I looked at the owner registry at the 2677 and 2679 to see what was there. There are six 2677 cars shown. Five have no louvers and one has three. They seem to look proper but 2677-5978 has louvers (fairly high # car) and 2677-5943 has none. Neither do 3512 and 4570. One would expect louvers on early and not late cars.

There are five 2679 cars shown. One has three louvers (PACDON but no VIN) Four have no louvers.

Danny Z - Looking at your car I suspect you are correct that the dealer added a louver. The spacing seems to indicate it was added at the rear. Looks good.

Robert

Well, I think we have settled that the 1951 louvers were di-cast and 1952-53 were stainless. So far there have been 20 entries on this thread - and not a single VIN to help pin down the change from 4 to 3 on the 1951 cars. Any VIN is useful, by the way. It does not have to be known to close to the switch.

Also - anyone ever seen or have record of a 1951 250 with no louvers at all that actually reached customer hands. There are factory pictures of early cars so done, and the first Packard ad showing a convertible pictured one. Also the original dealer brochure pictured one.

The louvres could be slightly different, I have not made a study of them, However, the 1954 parts book lists P/N 425598 for all 1951 cars using them and PA437490 for 25th and 26th Series cars. I don't know if they are different. PA prefix was assigned to accessories normally. They were available as such for cars without them after 1951, but they were also standard features on some models of 1952 and 1953 cars. Apparently the same par number was used for both standard and accessory louvres in 1952-53. They were only on the convertible and Mayfair in 1953.

Dave,

The update to information that is in the book sounds fine. I like to think that all my information and conclusions were 100% and nothing will change, but that is not life so something new is bound to show up eventually. If it is significant I will try to remember to post it in this thread.

I will start with the only oops I am currently aware of in the book. On page 17 one will find that the last sentance of text does not seem to have an end. It does, but unfortunately it got burried under the picture below. Modern publishing programs are great but their automatic features can sometimes bite you. In this case the picture box below the text got bumped up 1/10" or so during publication and tried to automatically push the displaced line of text to the next page, where it thought the text would continue. In this case this was the last line of text in the chapter and there was no place for it to get pushed to, so it just stayed burried under the picture. That line had two words - "that period."

Thanks for the notes posted so far. Yes Dave, I guess some dealers and owners did do things with the portholes, but I don't think that will pose a problem in research. For one thing, the VIN would most likely be so far out of range with other recorded cars that one would rule it out but also the location of the portholes would most likely be odd in one that was modified. The spacing is not the same on 3 and 4 hole versions. To change from one to the other would require filling old mounting holes and drilling new ones and repainting the repairs in order to be in the proper location. An item certainly not done by the owner who wants to add a hole and not likely something a dealer would have been requested to do. Robert

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Now that the Packard 1948 To 1950 book is finished and in print I am stirring up more trouble. I moved from the 23rd Series to the 24th Series cars and am starting with a little research on the 250 series convertible and Mayfair. An interesting pair since they were late comers to the line and were not introduced until February of 1951. They first hit the dealers with four "portholes" in the rear fenders and then shortly lost one (you can't have more than the Patrician, after all) and ended with three. There is even a story that a few VERY early ones got sold with no grill teeth and no portholes at all. That story appears to be a bit on the shakey side, but we shall see. There is no doubt that there are pictures of such cars, taken of the prototypes, but no verification thus far that any actually got in customer hands.

I am looking for VIN numbers of cars and their "porthole" count, three or four. There are lots of convertibles in the owner registry but no one seems to list the VIN number of their car. Sad, because this site would be a good research tool if VIN and engine number, and even firewall number and Briggs number, were listed. Without this information they become just and group of pretty cars as far as the historian is concerned. No numbers - no information.

I hope this thread starts a new trend, at least for the 24th Series cars, and owners start listing number information. This site has a very significan number of surviving Packards listed. It would be nice if it could be put to good historical use as well as the restoration help, etc. it now provides. Owners comonly ask me "how many were made like mine?" Packard did not record production by body until 1953. So if the owner wants answers he must not keep the numbers associated with his car a secrete. We historian are not magicians, just researchers chasing information and putting it together to form a story with answers.

Robert Neal RJNeal0000@aol.com