Packard Forum Index » Post-War (1946-54)

While you are rebuilding/replacing the fuel pump, I think it's a good idea to pull the tank and send it to a radiator shop that deoes the Re-Nu process. A good pump isn't much help if you can't get the gas to come out of the tank.

When I get a new car to work on where it is generally old, somewhat tired and unknown there is a sort of process I go through to insure reliablilty. Goes a little something like this:

Fuel system:
drop tank, remove sender from top, get a look inside (especially underside of top with a mirror), see if Re-Nu job is needed.
Fuel pump: automatic rebuild, latest material from then-now.com
line from tank: inspect, blow out W/ compressed air. replace if rusty.
Carb: see how she runs, choke settings and behavior, rebuild with fresh kit if necessary. Check float, should float

Cooling system: unless absolutely new replace all hoses, check radiator core, see if it needs boiled out or recore (not cheap, but sometimes the only thing to do) and belts. Check water pump for wear on bearing, have rebuilt or R&R. Check heater core too, it's part of the system.

Electrical: check battery cables, make sure they are of the proper gauge for that voltage/vintage.
Distributor:pull cap hold dist. housing and grab rotor with other hand and check for play of shaft in housing. This is a big problem that is often overlooked, I have seen rebuilt engines with badly worn distributor bushings, no way to accurately tune that engine!
The usual stuff, points, plugs, condensor, timing.

Also, a car with beautiful body work, paint, chrome, interior and detailing can have these problems just the same as a tired original car.
Most of this is small, incremental cost/short time requirement projects, the tank Re-Nu and the Rad. recore being the larger investments. But by going through all of these systems in a "whole patient" approach you are giving yourself the gift of reliability, and your family will appreciate this too.
Rmember the mantra "Old cars are fun, old cars are fun"

(rinse,lather,repeat)

Having had to do most of these things on my car just to get it running halfway decent, I concur with Mr. Pushbutton. An excellent post!!
Ken Dunning
kens53clip

I'd say that the tube in question is most definitely the road draft tube.

Having had to do most of these things on my car just to get it running halfway decent, I concur with Mr. Pushbutton. An excellent post!!
Ken Dunning

Yeah Ken, we usually stumble through these things one at a time, make the car run again until the next thing goes kablooey. I learned working on a 240 car collection where there were new cars coming in regularly how to make an unknown car (whole new game) a reliable member of the fleet.

So it's definitely the road draft tube. Not a big deal, it's just un-clipped. Thanks for the rundown Mr. Pushbutton. I'm on the right track for everything mentioned it's just that I've been going off of intuition rather than tested knowledge of folks like yourself. Electrical is pretty well sorted now. I have a tuneup kit on the way for the other incidentals in that area. About to order the fuel pump kit and have the water pump rebuilt. One thing that concerns me, or maybe I shouldn't be concerned with it depending on how some of you guys feel about it, is that the guy I bought off of had replaced the fuel tank with a very clean and new looking VW fuel tank and it fits the space very well. Is it OK to keep that on for a while as long as it is of good condition and fits or are there some problems with doing that which I'm unaware of? I have to take a deep breath when I see the cost of the real deal replacement tanks. I also noticed that the distributor does have some wobble in it... how large of an operation are we talking about for a fix like that?

Will let others speak to the dist wobble but as to gas tank, if it fits, in & out connections in approximately the right place, capacity is adequate and fuel sender mounts without too much trouble and works, let us know as much info as possible re model VW etc. The only thing is make sure it is vented or has a vented cap, otherwise unless you just have to have a Packard tank no need to change if it does the job.

Finding a good Packard gas tank is starting to get hard and expensive to have repaired so any possible alternatives can certainly be listed in the x-ref section.

If you are speaking of the distributor shaft wobbling in the distributor, then yes you will need to address the problem. Your points will not open correctly and consistently. Which of course causes poor running characteristics (missing).
It sounds like your distributor need to have the housing bushed which will remove the wobble. Or you can get a replacement distributor that is in good condition.
Good luck.

Re: Distributor wobble-- there are places that re-bush them listed in Hemmings in the "services offered" section. I used to ave a local shop that did it, they went put of business.

If the distributor shaft wobble side-to-side can be felt but not seen, it's probably marginally OK but if you can see ANY movement, it needs attention. It's not a difficult job for a reasonably handy person to rebush a distributor. I have often seen and bought various distributor shaft bushings at various flea markets just to have them on hand, or they can be made or purchased, if not in correct dimensions, in close-to the needed size and turned to needed dimensions. A nice, pleasant job for the home mechanic.

However, worn distributor bushings usually give erratic and poor performance, but don't give a complete engine cut-out when warmed up.

No, Owen-D, it will not cause the cut out. If anything it will make for hard starting. I offered it up in a list of things often needed when making an old car reliable. I worked on a friend's 1973 Pontiac Grand AM, a one-owner car (my late friend's) and the distributr was so badly worn that it would not start at times. Once it started you couldn't kill it. He had the car worked on at a local (Chcago area) garage, and I had the engne rebuilt for him here in Detroit, and no one addressed the distributor until I got into it, car wouldn't start and everything was basically OK, had fuel, at the carb, had spark, had spark @-near TDC, engine no runny. Got to looing at the distributor, holy Wah did it have play. Rebushed it, everything got good in a hurry. It's just something that shouldn't be overlooked in an overall reliability scheme.
Another topic drifted off course.