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Stewart......please post a pic of the rear portions of the back of your front seats as seen in pic (lower right) of the blast cabinet.

if I remember right the steering column has a coupling on the engine side that you just loosen and the whole unit slides right off the steering shaft. the shaft stays and the only way to take the shaft out of the car is to unbolt the steering box from the frame and remove as a whole unit.

I wish 55 was like 56 and had the rubber disc....because its a total PITA getting the body on and off with the steering shaft still on. I only had to do it about 5 times....sucked.

pitman arm....you need a pitman arm remover....can be rented at autozone.

you would not need the oil baffles if you have them do your heads to accept positive valve stem seals. see my thread for that. the umbrella seals are crap compared to the positive seals.

Hank

Kevin
Here are the pics of the seat you asked for. The trunk lid is laying across the the other end of it and all the cushions are stored up in the rafters.

Thanks Henry. I will be visiting a Harbor Freight tomorrow and they have Pitman arms removers on their website for $15 so I will try to pic on up. I'll remember the tip about the valve stems when I take the heads in.

I hope to get some work done this week.

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Thanks for posting Stewart. Interesting. May I ask what your 5587's trim codes were? There is just something very cool about that mono-toned design to the rear of the seats unlike mine.

I guess I never paid much attention to the white on white.

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I almost forgot.
I'm heading to Louisville tomorrow with a friend.
Besides stopping by Harbor Freight I am going to talk to a soda blaster about getting the Packard done this summer. We are also heading to a metal supplier. For the life of me I can't find what gauge sheet metal I need to match my Packard.
Can someone please refresh my memory?

I used 18ga cold rolled to make replacement panels with.

Good progress yesterday.
I love it when I have the right tools for the job.
The pitman arm remover I picked up at HF worked great. Hooked my impact wrench up to it and was done in about 8 seconds.
With that done I was able to pull the steering column and then the dash board. Getting those old brittle wiring harnesses through the firewall was a pain but its done.

Getting this posted early. We are under a winter storm warning for the next 18 hours. Lots of ice on the way and we are expecting to lose power for a time. Wanted to make sure I got my PackardInfo blog up-to-date before Armageddon.

If I don't reply to any questions its because we are in the dark.

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I spent some time this weekend breaking down the dash board. It's not done yet but its close.

All the knobs and dials had the spring type locks and were easy to remove, except for one. The fan control needed an allen wrench smaller than any I had.

I actually had to take a picture of it and enlarge the picture just to confirm that it was an allen screw. I couldn't make out the shape without the picture. The set screw on the trip meter dial is being stubborn as well.

There are some rusty holes on both ends of the dash. I won't know if I can fix it until I get it completely dissembled.

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Can you make out what the yellow markings are under the dash?

Is the top part of the dash rusted, or the bottom part?