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This car ran Great prior to the Head Gasket Going. I Bought this car fram a person that had it for Almost 30 Years. I contacted the person he bought it from and to my Knowledge it never had any Engine work done to it. It has only 96,000 Miles on it.

Fred;
When I originally replaced the Head Gasket and tried to start the Engine it wouldn't even turn over. I then removed the Plugs and Water Shot out of Several Cyclinder's. I then removed the Head and took it to the Machine Shop and they told me it was just hitting on the Ends and that they removed .0025 (thousands). I get spark from the coil. I even had the Machine Shop out to my House and Check it out, they Even Magna Fluxed the Block to check for Cracks.

I have been talking to Ross Miller and Bob Stoltzfus.

the4hundred
Steve

.0025 is TWO AND 1/2 THOUSANDTHS, .025 is TWENTY FIVE THOUSANDTHS. Of course that does not explain the compression problem.

A flathead Packard with no engine/valve wolrk in almost 100,000 is unusual.

Here's a story that may explain the problem. My son had a used late model Audi S4, after year of ownership (at 54,000 miles)it refused to start. We checked everything, then did a compression test, most cylinders were between 20 and 40 lbs. This is a high perfromance model which should have 140 lbs. Surely, we thought, our compression gauge was defective. Tested it in my Crown Vic and it was OK. Blew air into the cylinders and it came out both the intake and exhaust.

Tore down the engine, turned the head upside down and poured lacquer thinner into the combustion chambers, in seconds it leaked through the valves. Removed a few valves and found the guides excessively worn. The valves when closed did not center on the seats losing compression.Prior to this the car seemed to have lots of power and ran very well.

The Packard may have worn valves/guides. On the possibility it has a broken cam or jumped timing, in 57 years of working on Packards have never seen either. On the lifters being out of adjustment, the owner stated he removed , disassembled and cleaned the lifters. Therefore they are hydraulics and not adjustable

How long did the engine crank over trying to start and compression testing? Was the throttle open during the
comp test?
The reason I ask about the duration of cranking is that
the valve lifters need enough time to fill, valves can
cause poor compression by not opening enough as well as
not closing all the way. A relatively small portion of
the oil flow goes to the lifter gallery.

.0025 is 2 and a half thousands while 25 thousandths is .025. Big difference but I still learned my lesson about milling these flathead heads since they are so easily torqued down even when not totally flat that it isn't necessary to machine them.

How did you replace the head gasket? If it was one of the copper gaskets it HAS to be sprayed with copper gasket sealer on both sides. I didn't seal my first go round with my head gasket and what I got for my trouble was an engine full of water. Now my engine is at the machine shop for a total overhaul.

Copper head gaskets are much more compliant than steel/asbestos. We've never used sealant on any head gasket and never had any problems. If your head leaks water after installation I suspect your problem is not the lack of sealer.

I agree with Fred, I've probably done as many successful head gasket jobs without sealant as with sealant.

Something caught my interest earlier when the OP said that this engine "ONLY had 96,000 miles on it", or something like that. From that I'd guess the OP is younger than most of us and familiar with today's engines where 150 or 200,000 miles is not uncommon. But in the era of his Packard, reaching 100,00 miles without any series engine work was cause for modest celebration, a threshold not always reached. And certainly in that amount of miles you would have had at least 1 valve grind.

Just an Update on My Previous Post Of "Loss Of Compression After Valve Work"

I did a Leakdown test of all the valves to see if any of the valves were leaking by and found that none of them were.

Then I made sure that Each Pistion was in the Down Stroke and took a piece of Tubing and Squirted 2 Shots of Oil into Each Cyclinder and Viola the Compression came up from 96 Lbs. to 120 Lbs. Compression.

Put Everything back together and it started right up.

Stranger things happen I Guess?

Thanks everyone who responded to my Post.

Packard Eight
Steve

Glad it is running but isn't adding a teaspoon of oil to the cylinder and finding it increases compression a classic diagnostic for rings in need of attention. Now that the valves are working and sealing tightly, I would guess rings are next.

Out of curiosity, when you added the oil did you also happen to wipe or clean the plugs. I found on the 47 that if it cranked appreciably without starting, particularly if doing it over several days because of needing the engine to turn over when doing other things, the plugs managed to foul. Not sure what it was causing the issue but all seemed to be oily and moist. Once they were clean and dry the engine started with little difficulty.