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The BAT bulb could be burned out because of the 12v. The OIL would probably be due to to the missing sender. To test the bulb is not burned out as well, you can touch that sender wire to the block and light should go on. You are correct, the 2- feed wire should work in either place.

On your other problem, my engine had been rebuilt and briefly run but had sat for years. When getting it ready for starting this time, I was having issues with weak and intermittent spark so pulled the dist out. One thing I found was rust and corrosion on the block behind the distributor and on the distributor grounding areas themselves due to the long sit. Unfortunately I didn't think to take photos of the dist and had already hit the block with a brush before remembering photos. This is what my block looked like even after a couple of hits with a brush. Believe me it was much worse before. The inside of the dist also had a film of something that had condensed on the points and generally over everything inside.

While 12v might be able to tolerate those poor conditions when powering a 6v coil, 6v cannot. Yours should be nowhere close to this bad but If you still have issues with it starting on 6v, it might be worth a look at the dist and particularly the cleanliness of the grounds and connections. If you do pull it, to avoid retiming hassles just remember to take note of where the rotor is positioned before removing dist and then don't crank the engine while the dist is out.

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Thanks Howard! I will check out the distributor. Thats a great idea.

I forgot to mention that when I put the harness in I kept it attached to the gauges so the gauges from the '51 are now the ones in the car. There are all new bulbs in it, plus it was easier to put in and eliminates any resistors that may have been added to the old gauges.

5-14-14

So it turns out the BAT light has been working...it fell out of the cluster! I didn't realize it until I tried the car at dusk with all doors closed. When I went to put it back in the cluster, I found out I had the OIL and BAT bulbs in opposite of where they should be!

When I have time in the daylight, I am going to pull the distributor and clean up the ground contacts like Howard suggested.

Right now, it seems the car will only start if I put the jumper wire on the - side of the battery to the - side of the coil. Once started, I can remove the jumper. The car will also restart without the jumper. I think some surface rust has formed and all grounds and moving parts need to be gone over.

I put in the ignition from the '51 since the one in the '52 was messed up and turned with a screwdriver. The one in the '51 works with a key, but now I have to move it a little left of full on for the BAT light to stay on. If I go full to the right, the BAT light will go out and the car will not turn over. Probably dirty connections, but the ignition switch never gave me problems before.

Here is a list of electrical items that are working:
Car turns over with petal switch
Glove box light works
Door courtesy lights work
Parking lights work (passenger side is really weak, but that is old wiring still)
Turn signals flicker the dash lights and parking light and tail light flicker rapidly. Still not right.
Dash lights illuminate with the headlight switch
Ignition light illuminates with headlight switch in parking light position
Horn clicks the horn relay, but no horn sound. There is also a large horn object behind the grill that says 6v, but no horn noise.
Heater fan works

That is it so far. Headlights may be burned out from 12v. I have not replaced those. I'm hoping the car starts easier when I clean up the distributor and put in some new spark plugs.

Is it starting on the 6v with the jumper or are you still doing 12? It does seem strange that you have to use the jumper one time but not the next. I don't think that would be all ground issues -- although cleaning certainly wouldn't hurt it may not cure either.

The coil should be fed directly from the ign switch and unless you have added an electric fuel pump or something you only wanted active when the engine is running, is usually the only wire on the terminal. That terminal should only be active when the key is to the right.. Is it the standard Packard switch with 3 terminals labeled BAT, COIL and the long one GA? If the coil is wired to the proper terminal and wire is good and you still have to "hot wire" it then the switch is most likely bad.

The older thermal turn signal flashers depends on a specific resistance range in the light circuit to work properly. If a bulb is burned out, the wrong one, or you have a poor ground then generally the flashers will do strange things. Anything from a single flash and nothing, to rapid flash, to a constant on. If a socket has a bad or no ground, it is possible the turn signal filament could be trying to find ground by going thru the other filament out to another bulb and filament to use it's ground.

Do the tail lights work on the dim filament and brake lights work on the bright filament? If the filaments are reversed that could also be part of the issue. Same with the parking lights on dim and turn signals brighter.

Thanks again Howard. I have not had a chance to check everything on the list. I did check the ignition (OEM, no electric fuel pump) and the wiring is correct. I have been spraying some electrical contact cleaner inside the keyhole and it is working better, but still has to be just to the left of full on to illuminate the BAT light. Today the car started without jumping to the coil. Maybe the cleaner is helping, maybe not. I as happy it did start though. I am still going to go through all the ground areas and distributor like you suggested.

Great point on the turn signals. I remember someone posting that their taillights stopped working after they restored them. Turns out the paint was blocking the ground. Seems to have been my problem too. I sanded the mounting brackets and now I have taillights. I tried the turn signal (I have been spraying electrical contact cleaner in there as well) and they work! The light on the dash does not come on though. Maybe the flickering of the dash lights I saw was the turn signal light. Maybe I put it in the wrong hole? I'll try to check at night again.

The front passenger parking light is still dim, even after sanding the socket. Must me more corrosion or bad wiring still.

The brake lights do not work. The switch was disconnected when I removed the harness so it could be a problem with the switch.

I looked at that giant horn I have between the grill and the radiator. I see a tag that says AH-OOO-GA Horn 6v. Oh God! I want to hear what is sounds like but if it is what I think it is I don't think that will be staying!

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I had a similar issue on my 51. I cured the dim parking/turn lights by soldering a new ground wire to the housing, and attaching it to the body. Probably not the right solution, but rewiring the car is a project for another day. And it worked.

Thanks David,
It seems like a lot of electrical issues with the 6v system have to do with ground issues. Your solution will ensure that you always have a good connection. I'll have to redo that wiring anyway as well as the wires that go back to the tail lights. I will try to make as many good ground contacts as I can.

I think the kickdown switch for the overdrive is missing. There is a cluster of wires on the firewall that have been cut and taped. They probably went to the switch. I haven't looked for it yet though. I assume it would be under the car somewhere.

On a positive note, the car is starting regularly without jumping to the coil. The ignition switch is behaving better too. Maybe I need to get the cobwebs out of the car and my '51 parts from sitting too long.

The BAT light stays on or is dim while idling. I know staying dim can be normal, but the idle is too high so I think it should go out. I know you have to polarize the system on the voltage regulator, but for some reason I can't find the procedure in the electrical section of the manual. I must be over looking it. I know you have to use a jumper wire between 2 contacts quickly, but I can't remember which contacts they are. I will have to use my multimeter and read what the output is on the generator.

To polarize, just touch "bat" to "gen" for a moment. Or in other words, from the non-ground terminal of the battery to the armature post.

Lately when I have to wire the back end of a car, I buy trailer wire. It already has 5 colored wires in one neat black sheath. Saves a lot of time and makes a very tidy job. I also never bother to run it up in the headliner but run it along the floor right next to the sill plates.

Good to hear the car is starting to co-operate.

On polarizing. Everything off then use a jumper to short the GEN (or ARM) terminal and BAT terminal on the regulator together for maybe a second or so. There will be a small spark.

On the kickdown sw. It should be located in the hole the arrow points to on the accelerator bracket. On the R11 it would be a 4 terminal rectangular box. Bottom two terminals are the kickdown portion cutting ground from governor & lockout sw to the relay and upper two terminals would be for the ign cutout portion connecting solenoid contact to + coil terminal going to dist.

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5-20-14

Tried to feel around the gas pedal switch but I can't feel the kickdown switch. Looks like I will have to get under the car to know for sure.

Today I put in a new brake light switch and now the brake lights work! I may be taking the car for a maiden voyage by this weekend!

I replaced the spark plugs and did a compression test. Test came out pretty good. Here are the results:

Cylinder Dry Wet
1 107 107
2 110 110
3 105 110
4 105 110
5 115 115
6 115 115
7 95 95
8 100 105

The car started really fast with the new plugs. The tapping noise is still present. It still has the idle too high and wants to die if I rev it gently on the gas pedal. I probably need to rebuild the carb. I am tempted to put the rebuilt one on from the '51, but it is technically too small for this size engine. Still if the car ran well on it, I could drive around until I rebuilt the right one.

Generator was keeping the BAT light on yesterday, even after polarizing. It would go out if I revved the engine really high. Today, it went out immediately after starting. The gremlins in the electrical are still there. Maybe just need to run the car more. I did run it for 1/2 hour today and the temp gauge went 1/2 way between cold and hot and stayed there. That's good news.