Packard Forum Index » Modification Discussion

Back in the day I know that Ford owned the hot-rodders hearts with their V-8's, but did the little Packard 6 ever rival them? What kind of "speed parts" were (or are) available for the peppy little Packard six of the late 30's and early 40's?

A few years ago there was a pre-war Packard six coupe with triple carburetors that was displayed at the Sunday car show of California Mille on Nob Hill in front of the St. Francis Hotel. The side panels of the hood's right-hand side were removed to make room for the rear carburetor.

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I never heard of any hot rod six or straight eight Packards and I had practically all of the hot rod magazines from the little pages days on up.

There were a few Packard V8 powered dragsters when Packard liquidated their leftover engines in the late 50s.

The only Packard speed equipment I know of was made by Eddie Edmunds. His motto was "Modernize your Motor". He made aluminum heads, multi carb intakes etc. for all kinds of cars the other speed merchants wouldn't touch. As his motto suggests, his market was not racers or hot rodders but ordinary motorists who wanted a little more performance on the road. It was probably Edmunds equipment you saw.

Check out the 1952 Edmunds accessory catalog here:

packardinfo.com/xoops/html/downloads/1952_EdmundsBrochure.pdf

Actually, immediately after the war one of the hottest cars on the drag strip was the bone stock Packard 160 two door coupe. However, after a short period of speed shifting the transmissions literally blew up and the cars junked on the spot.

The 10th-11th series cars had superior enough power to weight ratios to get into amateur racing as well.

I used to have a picture of an 11th series Eight racing on dirt track and being pushed hard enough to almost lift the front inside wheel off the ground.

In the hands of a skilled driver the solid axle cars could corner surprisingly well. I knew one guy (Jake Clancy) who set a record hill climbing his father's 1932 Cadillac V-12 sliding it around turns at over 50 mph. Charlie threw a fit when he found out.

Packard power usually was achieved via displacement and too much power is lost turning extra metal in those motors.

Another problem is these old blocks have lost a lot of metal due to age and this affects things like burn rates. So about the only thing I see coming from super tuning might be a powerful explosion.

Turbopackman, Turbopackman. Where for art thou Turbopackman?

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Right here.

Unfortunately, when I think of performance engines, the Packard Six isn't one of them. I know of no add-on performance parts for the Packard Six, but that doesn't mean that they weren't made.

The thing to keep in mind is this, the last publicly US available Packard Six was in 1947, after that it was taxi and export only. Then of course the Six went on to live in White? trucks. Another thing to keep in mind is the fact that Packards were never advertised to be performance cars like Ford and Chevy were, they were silent comfortable luxury cars for people who drove them as such. In the early '50s, with Oldsmobile, Cadillac, Chrysler, and FOMOCO cars being the source of "hot rod engines" the Packard engines were overlooked. The transmissions however, were not. To have a Packard gearbox in your rod back in the '50s was to be avant garde`. Most of the time it was behind a Chrysler HEMI and a Caddy V8, as those were the engines to have back then.

I've always said that if Packard would have come out with even the 320 V8 back in '48-'50 (or even '51) the story of Packard would have been totally different. But making an engine for only two years in numbers that Chevrolet outproduced in a week doesn't give much credence to hot rodders. They used the most popular and most plentiful engines of the times, and any Packard engine wasn't one of them. The only reason why people used the V8's later was because they were being sold by the likes of JC Whitney for a lot less than it cost to buy and rebuild the other engines. And it's the same reason why they're not popular now, as no one is doing anything performance-wise to them, and those that do are having to make their own parts, as you can't buy performance parts for any Packard engine like you can with a Hudson six, early HEMI's, Olds, Caddy, and Ford flatheads. Any performance parts you can find for Packard engines will be old stuff from the '50s, expensive and rare. Try and find a performance exhaust manifold/headers for an inline Packard engine, not going to happen. Try the Packard V8, off the shelf. Not going to happen. If you want performance parts you're gonna have to do like me and everyone else that's tinkering with them, make them yourself or pay out the hiney to have someone make them for you, one-off of course.

Now, I'm not saying that you can make adequate power out of any Packard engine, you can, but it's going to take a LOT of work and ingenuity to get it done, and after all the money spent and time wasted, you will still have something that will be walked all over by a contemporary OHV V8. BUT, you'll be the coolest kid on the block with a 4bbl Packard Six, multi-carbed Packard I8, or a supercharged Packard V8. Trust me, I know, been there, done that, got the t-shirt.

In the 1960's I bought a 1940 Ford coupe with a 331 Hemi with a log manifold for 6 Stromberg 97's, a Lincoln differential and a PACKARD transmission for $300. Packard trans were known for being tough. My brother had a 1948 Ford and I bet he changed the trans every month. The old Plymouths and Dodges had a tough trans also but the Packards were the best. Sure wish I still owned that car or even still had the transmission. That old car would fly or at least I thought it did at the time. It seems that the older I get the faster I was!

In the early 50s Cunningham competed at Le Mans with a hopped up 331 hemi, ford based chassis and sports car body. They made better than 160mph down the Mulsanne straight which was 2 3/4 miles long.

Your Ford coupe was not as streamlined but other wise comparable in power size and weight. So 120 or better should have been a cinch.

The big thing to remember is the Packard was a very expensive car the the Ford V8's glory days not to mention the huge production of the Ford over the Packard it just made the V8 engine the choice of the common hot rod builder. However i am a firm believer that you can make any engine perform well it just takes some creativity and research.

Also the F flathead V8 (FOR IT"S DAY) is very compact and lite at about 550 pounds. Compare to any other engine even 6 cylinders of that time and space.

55 brought on the SBC. More power, better longevity, very compact and lite at about 500 pounds replacing the Ford V8.

Compact and lite as well as avaialbility of parts is what makes the hot rodders dream.