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Thanks Mal and Don,
just goes to show, "It's not what you know, it's who you know"

This past sunday I was a helper at the Bosch Boxberg classic, a rally here between Karlsruehe, Hockenheimring and the Bosch Proving grounds. The packard made it up to 75 mph at 2500rpm on the high speed oval and ran well. People loved it! My 14 year old nephiew was along for the ride and took the action shots from the passenger seat. Three weeks ago we were blessed with a second daughter, so my car time is limited, but that is ok. The packard is running pretty well. One of the cars in attendance of the classic car rally was a chrysler lebaron convertable circa 1985 (A 4 cyl K car!!!!) I couldn't believe it.
We drove a 100 mile round trip to the rally and back and enjoyed the packard. A few drops of coolant came out of the heater core or heater valve, so I will have to take a look at that soon. The core was rebuilt years ago, but the valve I have never touched, so that may be the problem. Enjoy the pics.
Oh, and while at the proving grounds I drove a little bit on one of those rough roads like from the packard proving grounds, and now the front sway bar came out of one of the brackets holding it to the frame. -The bushing slipped out of the loop....I'll have to put that back in and lubricate the rubber bushings on the sway bar.

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Looks like a great time was had and thanks for sharing it with us!! I can really appreciate the experience; though held to a conservative speed limit partly because we had so many early prewar cars, some years back on two of The Packard Club's Henry Joy Tours we were able to do laps as a group at both the Lime Rock and Watkins Glen high speed tracks in New York state. Here' a pix of the '34 sedately blasting along at perhaps 55 mph at Lime Rock.

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My car started leaking a little bit from the heater valve behind the glove box. I plan on rebuilding the heater valve, but would like to keep my car driveable with the valve out. I guess the easiest way would be to just connect the water outlet on the head to the water pump and temporarily bypass the whole heater.
Or, I could leave the heater core functional, but take the valve out for a while.
Any risk to either method? One way I have no heat, the other way, I have heat all the time.

You can do either method and both have been done in the past without difficulty. If you go with the output direct to the return a significant portion of coolant will always be short circuited around the radiator and keep getting heated unless you add some kind of restriction to cut the flow way down. A normal no issues cooling system can handle the extra heat of the continuous flow but if the car tends to run hot or the cooling is compromised in some way the coolant being bypassed will keep getting hotter and maybe get to the point where the cooling capacity is compromised.

If you do not have an underseat heater the output to pump bypass method is easier since you can use the single hose and just relocate it. With the underseat heater the water pump hose will be running directly to that core instead so you would need to find another hose. If you go this route I would advise an inline valve between two of the existing hoses or some kind of restriction such as a marble or dowel if a single hose that will restrict water from circulating. Just make sure whatever you use is easy to remove yet large enough not to get into the engine thru one of the pipes Too large to get out and you will be buying a new length of hose..

Keeping the heater core in the loop should be fairly easy to do with the existing hose lengths and if the air flapper valve rubber is in good condition and the air valve kept in the off position there should not be enough extra air reaching the core to make the always on part a problem.

The heater valve is going in soon. Geez I am slow with some non-urgent repairs. I got a rebuilt valve from speedwell garage, but still have to swap it in. We built a new house and a 18x27 garage, so the packard has a new home. I am still organizing the garage/workshop.
I have just about gotten through half a tank of fuel this season, and the car has been running great. Lots of fun driving through the vineyards where we live now. Anyway, this evening after a half hour drive something started whisteling from what sounds like either the water pump, generator or fan belt area. Guess I will disconnect the belt and see if it stops. Any suggestions about what could whistle there? It is almost a shreeking noise. Some sort of stethoscope would probably be usefull to locate the whistling culprit.
Best regards, Mike

Not sure yet what is making that noise. When the vehicle is cold, or only run for 15 min (to or from work) I am not getting anymore whistle. I am getting up to operating temperature, but I guess not hot enough on the waterpump or generator that I suspect was making noise....I guess I will keep driving and keep my ears and eyes open.

My parking brake was not working so well, so I did a minor brake adjustment for the first time in 2k miles. Now the brake pedal has less travel and parking brake holds better. Most of the regulars here know these brake don't have self adjusters, but some might appreciate a "public Service announcement" to adjust your Brakes every once in a while.

Also, when driving, I was often getting a whif of exhaust inside the car. This morning I put tape over the trunk lid gaps while driving to work, and the car was much less smelly inside. I need to adjust my trunk lid and get it sealing better...

I also finally replaced the leaky heater valve! Nice that I can fit a bucket underneath the Radiator without jacking up the car.

Also nice to have a Garage where I can work for some time after the kids are in bed each night and the "honey do" list is taken care of!

Passed T?V (German safety inspection) again last week, and adjusted my trunk lid. I had been sucking in fumes through a mis-adjusted trunklid for much too long!
Car is much nicer to drive with only the smell of fresh air. Wish I would have done that sooner, but these things take time -for me at least.
Next up is to change from AC-R45 spark plugs to some Autolite 308 plugs. I gapped them to 0.7mm (0.027 Inch) and come recomended by many.

I think you'll be very pleased with the AutoLite 308 plugs, I've used them in just about every Packard that uses 14mm plugs with equally good results.