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Finally had mine out today in spite of considerable rain. Temp is in the 80s and it is somewhat muggy.

Car ran like a swiss watch; air cooled before I got out of the driveway. The Sanden compressor and Mark IV setup gets'er done!

Plus, NO foggy windows at all!

Put on 40 miles today with no hitches. Lovin it....

yeah i have a feeling that one of these hot ass days in Texas when we are driving in the ole girl...my wife will look over at me with wet pits and give me the evil eye that will prompt me to put A/C in.

lol

At 80 we just put down the windows and run a little heater here in Phoenix.

I was out running errands at lunch time in my Cavalier and the add-on was doing OK, temperature was about 105.

We are supposed to hit 115 next week, that will be a test.

I would like to see some pictures of the original factory A/C parts. From what is in the owner's manual it almost looks like the Factory air was almost an add-on.

I don't know what the vent setup looked like with the trunk unit.

I figure there were two fan belts and those parts are somewhat scarce.

Jim

Packards1 had a set of the dual special matched 53-4 belts on his ebay store for a long time. He's closed for the meet but they might still be available. The original drive and compressor pulleys and bracket with idler would also be needed to use them.

The vent on the package shelf is a mixed bag. The original 53 had flat louver type vents and I know they were also on some 54s. Packards1 and others made mention of the clear plexiglass forward facing roof skimming ducts also being available. Those I think might have been a later addition since there is no part number in the manual for a second type item. Here is a couple of photos. The black and white photos were some I took of a 54 Patrician long ago when getting info for duplicating a unit. The color photo I believe is from an ebay car. You can see in the black and white photo the outlets are on the outside and are forward facing grills with straight slots. Two oval grills which look suspiciously like rear seat speaker setups for the return air. In the other photo you can see the plastic ducts for the outlets with the same oval air returns. A rectangular grill for a speaker is in the center.

The 53 Packard unit was made by Frigidaire and is functionally identical to Cadillac's 53 version -- although Cadillac may have had their clutch in 53 as well as 54. Packard had no clutch and used direct drive where the belts had to be removed to keep the compressor from operating. Cadillac made some improvements for their 54 offering but Packard used the same 53 unit again. Temp control was electric and used the hot gas bypass system controlled by a solenoid valve. The valve was operated by a driver adjustable mercury thermostat located in the return air duct. The adjustment was made by turning a rheostat which controlled a heater wrapped around the mercury bulb. To make the car cooler, the heater voltage was increased to warm the heater more. This "fooled" the mercury into thinking the air was warmer than it actually was.

I can tell you that with the straight louvers the rear seat people were in an icebox while the driver was probably comfortable or maybe even still hot. Haven't ridden in a car with the clear ducts so I sure hope they were an improvement.

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