Packard Forum Index » Project Blogs

We're having a bit of difficulty getting the trip to trip, so to speak. Care not to break stuff. The clock runs but the knob is missing. I'm going to look into heisting another while I'm here.

Fred in her natural habitat:

Attach file:

---

  IMG_1222.jpg (650.75 KB)


  IMG_1225.jpg (817.58 KB)

Got in some quality wrench time on the anvil (Deluxe) yesterday. Wat loves engine piddling. Anyway, yesterday was the Test The Coil Theory day. We got a new hotter 6v coil because hotter. The intuitive suspicion was that the old coil is likely original and just wasn't making as much spark as it used to and that it made spark on its terms more than mine.


So, we had to take out the old coil, which is easy enough. It has the annoying hot-wire-to-the-bottom arrangement, but prying a-loose 3 of 4 tabs makes the bottom slide off. Of course, the screw wouldn't turn for love or money, so wire snips got us a workable hot wire. We have a wee collection of wire mending ends, so we made a wire extension to get us inside the engine compartment with a bit of wire to spare.


The first attempt at mounting the new coil was too high so the coil wire ended up being too short. Lowering the new coil helps that, and it made reattaching the harness clip that hadn't been refastened during the rebuild easier, too. Two clips, one screw. Keeping both the wire and the coil away from the throttle linkage, the new location worked better, and it's upright as it should be. We can get a new longer coil wire later. Went and cranked it to make sure that Wat hadn't killed it, and it fired off on the first half a crank. Impressive! So since the distributor kit had come with new plugs and plugs are easy peasy on these cars. Wat spent 17 minutes that he'll never recover taking out 8 adequate plugs and replacing them with new. The color on the old ones was good, which was/is relieving. We gapped these at .034" for a bit more uuumph since we have more fire, and the test crank was the same half-crank fireoff. Be curious to see how long it takes to fire this morning.


It was all kinda hot yesterday. Difference is, the breeze blows here and there ain't one back to home. We go in this morning to meet with The Banker Lady about the place across the road. Maybe there will be enough money left over to start building Wat's hanger.

The gap is a big large if still 6v positive ground! Shouldn’t it be more like .028”? Maybe Fred knows for sure.

You, sir, are working on my dream Packard. Dad had a ‘47 sedan in a similar grey to your parts car.

When I discovered how lovely the 2-door versions were, they became my favorites.

Catnip for Wat?

Couple topics up I read something about your clock knob falling off? Maybe you need the easily dropped and lost setscrew?

Attach file:

---

  16552466937115328209287477527446.jpg (164.09 KB)

Quote:


Ordinarily, I'd question it, maybe. But I read it online, and it has to be the 1000% God's Honest Truth because I read it online. It's still 6v but I bought the hottest 6v coil I could find. I can't remember the output voltage, so I'll have to look that up. And, somehow, I managed to buy 2 of them, so I can do this again if need be.

The existing plugs I removed were .030+", so with a tired coil, that may have contributed to its starting issues as much as anything. I went to crank it yesterday morning, and I did what the owner's manual said. I turned on the key, no patting the pedal, and just pushed it to engage. It fired off on half a crank. I still have points and condenser to install, and the cap was back-ordered, so I figured that I'd do all those when the cap gets in and check out the guts for looseybits.

We did go for a longish drive yesterday, and it was hot as Hell. When the guy put this car back together, he installed a 195* t-stat and a new water temp gauge. It held right at 200* in the heat, which was impressive. But the car bogs slightly on light acceleration, like to account for changes in grade or to change speed. I wondered that, if the carb is set up to run at 165* and it's running hotter, if some setting on the accelerator pump is off now because of this. It also was a bit hard to start after it had sat for 20-25 minutes, and it stalled. It did restart and went ahead and ran fine (save for the wee bogging) on the way home. It does pull nicely when foot is applied to loud pedal.

Still, I think I'm going to trailer it to the car show tomorrow - so it doesn't embarrass me (or Fred). After all, Wat can do that enough all on his own . . . .

Quote:

I was looking for an old car - couldn't decide which. I did have a 1965 Dodge for awhile, and it was fun to get into but wasn't quite right. I always liked the "torpedo" styling. I think that GM did it best, but Packard had the bigger engines and were inline, and that appeals to my anacronistic thinking. That and my grandfather had a couple of bathtubs as daily drivers in the 60s until he died in '81. But he insisted on sedans, and I'm not convinced even though that's my current driver by default. The bathtubs had coupes, too, but I found the Clippers and it all fell together. The roofline is a touch high compared, say, to the Cadillac fastback, but all in all it's a good looking car and it's what I intend to work on. Good thing, as 10 of them have followed me home now. Piece at a time, I'ma gonna get good at it.

My concession to hot rodding is the idea of building either a 356 or a 9-main 327 and installing it into a SWB coupe. The first coupe I bought is a '47 six and would make a fabulous candidate. I also have a '47 Deluxe with no immediate plans. And I have the Custom coupe which needs to go back as Allah intended because there just aren't very many of the darned things.

The issue with a positive ground car is the direction of the spark and the temperatures of the two surfaces from and to which it jumps. On positive ground cars, it has to work harder to bridge the gap and hence the narrower setting. I seem to recall that on my 1940 it was only .025” but I typically set it to no more than .028” if I wanted it to run smoothly under all circumstances.

Quote:

Don, can you expand on what you mean by "the direction of the spark and the temperatures of the two surfaces from and to which it jumps"? Are you saying on a positive ground car, the spark does not travel from the center electrode to the ground electrode?