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Thank you, Don! That's close enough.

I finally got my hood supports installed. Now that the car runs, it will be nice to be able to work on the car without having to remove the hood and definitely nicer to drive than without the hood.

I also went ahead and dressed it back up a bit and put the hubcaps back on. The spare tire covers will wait. They are a pain and the spares will be coming off any time I need to work in the engine area.

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Looking good!

Thanks, Kev.

I’m really hoping to be to point where I can do what you’ve done with your ‘37. Drive it a bit, then tackle a project. Drive some more, then the next project and so on.

Things I need to figure out….

I’m not sure the generator is charging. I think that may have been the issue with the lights and the very slow crank to restart the other day. It sounds like that could be as simple as polarizing the generator. If not, I’ll need some help from the group.

Then, I never saw the temperature come up on the gauge. My assumption is that the gauge has a problem.

Given that the fuel gauge is sticking intermittently, the oil pressure gauge isn’t working, and the temp gauge isn’t working, I may send all of them off to be repaired over the winter. I’ll take any recommendations anyone has for where to send those. I know I’ve seen a couple of places on the internet. Anyone have personal experience with https://www.clocksandgauges.com?

Sometimes it’s the little details that make you smile.

After a long search, I finally found the right air cleaner.

During my search, I had noticed that many air cleaners of this type have all cracked right where the support bracket mounts. Presumably due to vibration.

Before installing my new air cleaner, I had an oversized “washer” made to distribute the load better. I think it looks pretty good and should help prevent a problem later. An old friend made it for me since I didn’t have the equipment to roll it to fit the radius of the air cleaner.

The oil bath air cleaner isn’t going to improve any performance over the paper air cleaner that Dad installed back in 1960, but it sure does look at home! Again, little things that make you happy!

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Looks great!

Thanks.. Here is a picture without the “washer”. You can see its already had some stress.

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Well, after no work on the car over the past week (moving my daughter from NC to Nashville), I finally got around to installing an after market (and temporary) temperature gauge to go with my aftermarket (and temporary) oil pressure gauge since neither were working.

I was able to make use of existing holes under the dash to mount the meters. I used one of the holes for the heater to route the temperature sensor since I don’t currently have the heater installed.

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Today was a good day with the Packard….perfect weather. I got up early and let the car run for a bit to warm up and then changed the 19 year old oil. Then out for a short drive . Came back and checked things over and everything looked good so took it back out. Along the way, I got it up to 55mph briefly, but mostly stayed on nice county roads at about 45lbs. It was a lot of fun. I drove it about 40 miles total. When I got back, I changed out the coolant. I clearly got the 20 years of crud broken loose. I had drained it once before and it looked pretty clean. But, I was really only draining the radiator and not the block. Still more to do there.

Thanks to Don Koller, I’ve been in contact with Allen Rich in Wichita. I’ll be getting the car to him in a few weeks. He’s going to go through the suspension and steering. I’ll probably also have him take a look at a few things engine wise...like really flushing the coolant system.

By late winter, I should have a good road-worthy car. Then, I can start on things like the window regulators etc…followed by body, paint and upholstery.

EDIT: I forgot to mention I had checked the battery voltage last night and it was just over 6.4V. After the first short drive, the battery was at 6.5V. So, polarizing the generator did the trick. Well, that and figuring out that I have my ammeter wired backwards. I’ll deal with that another day. The battery voltage was still good after the 40mile drive as well. Woohoo!

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Relatively easy project for tonight…Gains made and steps taken back.

On the gains, I played contortionist and got under the dash and reversed the ammeter connections, so now it reads positive current when charging and negative when discharging as it should.

The minor set back is that I broke my switch for my front dome light. It may be repairable, but if anyone has a switch like this, I’d be interested. I have another switch wired up in the meantime, but I’d like to find one styled like this one as it matches the two switches for my rear dome light.

If you have one, let me know.

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