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Hello,

Still on the hunt for a project car. I am going Saturday to look at a 55 Patrician. The motor turns over has some rust in floor bd. drivers side. Is ther things I should look for or ask. I am a newbie to Packards, always worked on Studebakers. The price for this car is quite resonable,compared to what some want for rust buckets in my area.

thanks.

Clyde

Is the car sitting level or will it level. If the suspension isn't working could be simple fix or quite expensive. Early 55 trans were a bit finiky as the changeover from the old style ultra to twin ultra hadn't been thoroughly worked out. Hopefully that one had all the updates. Some trim kinda hard to get but other than those items, can't think of anything that stands out. Very nice cars once cleaned up and running.

Hello Clyde,

Is this the car you will be looking at? If so, you are correct that it is reasonably priced. It looked fairly complete. I hope it is the one you are looking for. The packard projects in the Pacific Northwest do tend to be a bit rusty due to all the moisture.

Patricians are usually heavily optioned, so the asking price is well below what all the parts are worth. Watchout for rust round the headlight assemblies. Infact, take a phillip head screw driver with you and remove the chrome facia plates off the front of the headlight area and do a careful check for rust. Check out the bottoms of the doors and the toe boards on the inside of the car. Check the body mount arms coming off the frame that bolt the body to the frame.

If this isn't the car, contact me and I will forward you the information.

Good luck.

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Guess that's one nice thing to say for Central Calif. I would never have thought of looking for rust because other than surface, it's rarely an issue here. Transplanted cars, different matter.

When it comes to rust-through, aside from the most visible, check:

floor pan - front extension (toe board to kickpanel)
floor pan - body mount areas
floor pan - cross-body reinforcements (to inner rocker)
floor pan - remove rear seat bottom
floor pan, trunk - rear trough, esp. body mount area
front fenders - headlamp brows
front fenders - ahead of wheel (under turn signal trim
front fenders - under heavy die cast molding
front fenders - rear of wheel
front doors - skin separating at bottom
rear doors - skin separating at bottom
rear fenders - wheel openings (fit of skirts)
rear fenders - outer wheelhouse (at top of wheel opening)
rear fenders - rear of wheel (under gravel shields)
rocker panels - inner & outer

hh56,

I love central california cars. Such nice sheetmetal. They don't use Road Salt in Washington & Oregon, so we don't get the typical rust like back east. We get the rust from cars siting stationary and water puddles up and rusts through. Or Moss is a big problem. It holds water like a sponge in places that water would normally run off of. The only really bad undercarriage rust we see is from field cars that have sunk into the mud for 30 plus years. This is sad because alot of those cars were low mileage and parked years ago but will never be anything more than a parts car due to the undercarriage deterioration.

We're spoiled here, no question about that. About the only car I can think of ever seeing bad rust is my 5697 that was originally from the SF area. The roof was full of holes but I blame that entirely on the felt they used as padding under the top. Your moss has nothing on the Packard felt when it comes to holding water. Other than that, the car was rust free--even the places you mentioned.

Hi Don, That is the car. I will let you know what I find out. Thanks, Clyde

hh56,

THANKS FOR THHE TIP ON THE LEVEL OF THE CAR. IT HAS THE SELF LEVELING AND ALL THE OTHER GOODIES I BELIEVE.

THANKS AGAIN,

CLYDE

BRAIN,

YOU ARE SO RIGHT, SEEMS LIKE ALL I HAVE LOOKED AT LATELY IS RUST BUCKETS FOR ANY WHERE FROM $2000 to $5000. Thanks again Clyde