Packard Forum Index » V-8 (1955-56)

Craig,

Thanks for your comment on the thread, and additional on-topic information--well-informed as usual. Good to see you posting here. Any news on the Panther? Your website and writeup was how I got to AACA, and from there to here.

Loyd,

Revving a 454 without a load was a recipe for disaster, too, even though they're distantly relatives of the 348/409 in the BB clan. I know how they blow from personal experience. I did it once to my dad's '74 pickup. And I didn't even rev it that much, just enough to keep it from dying every time you put it in gear. The carb was twitchy.

It also wasn't the first time that engine had a serious internal breakdown. After the second rebuild, it went up for sale and was replaced with a Buick 430, which raised the front end of the truck about 6 inches. The 454 was bought almost immediately be a fella that couldn't believe how lucky he was!

No offense intended, but I can hardly find words to describe how unimpressed I am with the Chevy BB. I think they have a loyal following more because of their flaws than in spite of them. Needing to defend them brings out the protest.

But again, the sheer audacity of putting that huge truck engine in various sizes of cars is something to marvel at. And others would point at the 430 in the truck and say the same thing. But at least the 430 didn't break down all the time.

BTW, since I haven't seen an answer to my previous OT question, the Corvette straight six was called the "Blue Flame."

Oldsmobile and Cadillac OHV8 - 1949
Studebaker and Chrysler OHV8s - 1951
Buick OHV8 - 1953
Ford OHV8 - 1954
Chevrolet, Pontiac and Packard OHV8s -1955

Yes, Packard V8s had design compromises which were weaknesses for high-performance and long life - oiling system problems, weak main bearing bulkheads and weak lifter bores. However, eleven years after the Packard, Buick's big block V8, one of the last classic GM OHV8 designs, debuted in 1966 with exactly the same design compromises. It was aimed at the same market as was the Packard V8 and never designed to make big horsepower or withstand high revs. Today's Buick racers have to add a main bearing girdle, epoxy between the lifter bores and reroute the oil system.

thnx, jack vines

Thanks for noting this, Jack, as I think a lot of folks might not know that the last great from-the-ground-up GM V8 big block was by Buick.

Yes, the good ol' thin-wall casting Buick. They had some horsepower to weight ratio! Probably one of the best ever non turbocharged. And the Stage II heads were some of the best breathing ever.

One good reason why Chevy put those fat b*stard 454's in cars: They were needed for Chevy trucks and what kind of economic sense would it make for Chevy to create a big "car" V8 from scratch.

A lot of people are very much into the last generation Buick V8s, even to the point where a new block casting has been designedt. Lots of talk on another forum about Buick's performance engines.

Also, it's pretty amazing how, except for all-out racing purposes, these "light" V8s could withstand street racing punishment and haul around a big Deuce and a Quarter full of people-- probably dragging a trailer--and not even seem to work hard. They had TORQUE.

Maybe it didn't make great revs but a lotta guys surprise a lotta people at the track with bone stock 430's and 455's. One testament to their strength is how many are still around. What a shame they didn't put them in the last generation rear wheel drive Rivieras, and settled instead for an Olds 307. Sad. I suppose it was emissions or "economy" pressures. But one not-too-well known secret is that the Buick big blocks with 4 barrel could easily get you up to 20 mpg cruising. Think of how efficient these engines really were, MUCH more than econo 4-cylinders that were getting 30 or so mpg in much lighter and more aerodynamic bodies.

But since this thread is on Packard V8s, I'm wondering how efficiently they operated. My dad was of the opinion that they were an impressive engine because they seemed to continually get more efficient the faster the car was driven, because at almost any speed (dad drove between 55 and 90 on the highway) they got right around 13 mpg in spite of the greater wind resistance. This was observed over a lot of miles in three different cars equipped with 352 cid engines. Two were 4-door Clipper Customs and one was a 400. The heavier 400 had milled heads, so even thought it was heavier, it might have gotten similar mileage because of the extra compression.

Anyway some thoughts to ponder. Anyone here think the Packard V8 could have been well-served by higher compression ratios? The 400 had much peppier acceleration with a hefty .125 shave. "Snap your neck off" as they say.

While gas mileage isn't all that important to me as I only drive my Packards 500-1000 miles a year, I'm reasonably satisified the my 56 Caribbean mileage, considering a high mileage (90,000) original engine. I don't do jack-rabbit starts and normally cruise at about the speed limits on Interstates (65 mph or so) and get, give or take, 15 mpg on today's ethanol-laden gasoline, which is perhaps closer to 16 with the good old juice. I'd guess that 55 Caribbeans, despite fewer cubic inches, don't do as well all other things being equal because of 55 dual 4GCs have larger primary jets than secondaries (reversed for 56) and don't have the air velocity dampers in the secondaries. Given the weight of the car, I think that's decent mileage. It's a lot better than my 34 Eight which has all the aerodynamics of a brick, it gets about 10-11 pretty much regardless of the speed (highway speeds of 45-50 tops). That's with the standard 4.69 rear axle ratio.

The mileage that I get with my '55 Pat 352 is about equal to that that I got with all of the Cadillacs that I drove between about 1968 and 1986. I always told people that they got about 13 mpg whether or not they were tuned up, all four tire were flat, whatever. Every one of them averaged right at 13 mpg combined city/highway driving. The Patrician is about the same. It gets between 10 and 11 mpg in town with the A/C running in Orlando traffic and between 15 and 16 on the highway (as long as you keep it under 75). Almost two years of keeping track of the mileage has given me almost the exact same figures that I got from all of the Caddys over about an 18 year period. Appears to be about the same as any other big V8 in a comparably sized car between the mid-1950s and mid 1980s.

On the subject of gas mileage, there's no particular reason that the 55-56 Packard V-8 should get better or worse mileage than any comparable design of the era. Although the big Packard will run on the freeway and NV roads all day at 85+MPH and still get decent mileage.

In one long PI tour that I drove in through NV and AZ based out of Laughlin, my Pat got 16.1MPG. The best Packard got about 18MPG, IIRC. The rules were to fill up at the same gas station before the tour (a couple of hundred miles of both freeway and stop-go intown driving) and after the tour. The official mileage was then provided by somebody "official" and the the mileage calculated. I thought 16MPG was pretty good.

I have somewhere some engine VE curves and also aerodynamic drag and tire friction curves (power required at speed) if anyone is interested in some info that is more hardcore than anecdotal.

Craig

Quote:

I believe this is true. Road tester extraordinaire Tom McCahill told the same story many years ago.

It seems he tested the 1948 Olds 98 and was not impressed. He described it as being "as exciting as a pocket full of wet pancakes" and said "when you step on the gas you get a squish instead of a swish"

Oldsmobile owners and dealers screamed blue murder. But years later, an Olds insider thanked him!

It seems Olds was lobbying for the new engine, and the McCahill article was the clincher they needed to convince top management to give the new engine to Oldsmobile instead of an unnamed rival. But it seems logical to conclude that the rival was Buick.

Quote:

Lloyd,

That was our experience exactly. It was kind of the "magic 13" that by the time you got through a tank of gas after various starts, warmups, and driving speeds/conditions, that mileage number almost always came up.


Craig,

VE numbers for Packard V8's would be just great. Especially if you can compare them against Chevy BB. Very interesting. Volumetric Efficiency is really the overall "acid test" of a well designed engine of any displacement.

Thanks for offering. It would be a nice "spec" to add for the Packard V8 record.

Quote:

Based upon my DynoSim calculation, the '56 Caribbean has a V/E of 82% @ 4,000 RPMs.


Quote:

There are literally hundreds of different versions of the BBC. Choose an easy target such as the mid-70s smog motor and it has a V/E of maybe 75% or less. Choose big dogs such as the '65 396" 425hp or the '08 572" 650hp and they have a V/E of 90+%.


thnx, jack vines

Thanks, Jack

How about if we pick a fairly apples-to-apples comparison from the period in question when Chevy might have been looking at adapting the Packard V8.

Say the 348 Chevy of 1958 vs the 352 Packard of 1955 (the "senior" engine).

&

The first generation 409 Chevy vs the 374 Packard of 1956, both with single carbs, and/or both with multiple carbs (3 deuces in the Chevy and 2 4bbl in the Packard.


Hey, we're back on topic!

Anybody have original Packard VE specs on the Packard?

Craig?

How about we do a side-by-side comparison of HP, Torque curves, VE, weight?

I guess the question becomes, would the Packard BB have been a good choice for Chevy in 1958.