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My long dormant Panther Project regained momentum a few months ago and is presently proceeding apace on several fronts: headers (2 sets in production assembly), interior (insulation & A/C), chassis (fuel system & brake lines), body customization (mild) and hood (custom).

The purpose of this thread is to present to PackardInfo some design considerations and construction details on the Panther custom hood. The following initial posts are the "show & tell" of that.

Craig

While researching the idea of a custom hood for my Panther Project, I started with what Packard had done.

The 1953-54 Caribbean (1954 shown):


1955 Caribbean:


1956 Caribbean (also 1956 "Panther" what-if in Collectable Car magazine article):


1954 Panther #4:


1950 "Styling Exercise (I really like this one!):

There are many, many examples of hood scoop (single and twin) designs extant. Out of the many I looked at here are a couple that made the final selection cut:

PHR Mustang:


1971 Pontiac GTO:

I decided on the 1971 GTO hood. As many of you know, I was involved in the 1970s with high performance Pontiacs with my company H-O Racing Specialties, so I have a soft spot for Pontiacs.

Last Fall, I found a decent used 1971 GTO hood on ePay in SoCal for a $300 "Buy it now" price. I have a friend who owns a 1971 GTO, so I called him for measurements on his hood to find out if it had a chance of fitting on my Panther (nee 1956 Clipper). The measurements seemed good, so I paid the seller's asking price. Another friend who was driving from SoCal to Pahrump anyway and has a pick up truck agreed to stop on the way and load the hood and deliver it to my house.

As delivered by Kenny's truck (my 1956 400 parts car in the background):


As soon as we unloaded the 1971 GTO hood, we laid it on top of the 1956 400 hood to eyeball how close a fit it would be. If properly cut down, this looks like this will work!

In order to mate the 1971 GTO hood to the 1956 Clipper hood, the GTO hood has to be cut on all 4 sides and the Clipper hood has to have a corresponding hole cut in the right place in the "middle" of it. There also has to be enough extra edge material on the Clipper hood to make a 3/8IN flange all the way around the inside of the hole.

My friend Roy drove over from SoCal to help with the project and spent 3 days and nights at my house (2 days of actual work). Here is Roy making an intial access hole with a pneumatic cutoff hand tool on the GTO hood after we had scribed an oversize pattern on it. We used an Eastwood metal pneumatic shear to do most of the linear cutting.



Center part of the GTO hood after being cut free. This was purposely done oversize, so after more trial fitting and measuring, we will cut it down to exact size. The outside sheet metal and underlying bracing is now scrap.



Three views of the cut down, but oversize GTO hood placed on the Clipper hood (we are getting close!):

A corresponding hole had to be cut in the Clipper hood. Here is one example of the scribe lines. The outside line is a trace from the final cutdown GTO hood top and the inside line is for the 3/8IN flange ledge.



The center of the Clipper hood cut out. Don't let the lack of pictures between these two pictures fool you. The Eastwood metal shear was barely able to cut the Clipper sheet metal which was only 0.004 thicker than the GTO hood sheet metal but was made of some kind of super strong steel. I had to turn the compressor pressure 10 psi over "max" of 90 psi, we had to lube the cutting blades constantly, Roy had to push really hard on the shear & position it exactly at a certain angle and I had to manually pull the cut metal out of the way. What a job!



A closeup of the front center of the cut out. The small hole is the forwardmost mounting hole for the hood ornament.



Roy using the Eastwood pneumatic flanging tool to create the flange on the inner edge. The top will lay on this flange and then be welded in place.

Here are some pix of the top and bottom of the Panther Hood Assembly. At this point only gravity is holding them together as the top is laying on the inner flange of the bottom. Later, the two will be welded together, etc.




This last picture in this series shows the GTO scoop inserts temporarily reinstalled to show more clearly how the Panther hood assembly will look on the car.



Questions and/or comments are welcome.

Craig

I think that is awesome! I love it when people can creatively mix parts and make something unique, but well proportioned.

I'm sending this on to my brother and buddy, both GTO men. They will get a kick out of this.

Quote:

... and there are still those who insist that the steel in post-'50s cars is somehow superior.

Nice to see the progress on the Panther Project!

Panther hood (1971 GTO hood mated to 1956 Clipper hood) is nearing completion. My website documents the progress and where it is now, so I won't duplicate pix here. To finish it, I have to complete the assembly of the engine, get it installed in the chassis, remate the body to the chassis, mount the front fenders and THEN I can figure out the exact thickness of the foam mating/sealing piece between the "Ram Air" ducting and the carbs. I and my helper have been having a lot of fun with this.

1956packardpanther.com/Panther/custom3.html

Craig