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I wouldn't put Slick 50 in bin laden's car...on second thought, I would

Thanks Eric. It's obviously been a long (very long) labor of love. I'm trying to keep it very original looking BUT functional for today's roads.

A big exciting day for me in the garage today. My pal Tom & I 'spun' melling oil pump in the Packard today. I used 15w40 (sl) oil and got a strong reading at the driver's side front pressure gauge I put into the car. I also got a reading inside on the dash gauge. I wish the gauge inside displayed numeric markings as does the one in the '55 Packard owner's manual.

I only had a couple of leaks. Most obvious was the drain plug (duh) and one of the new fittings near the distributor. The full-flow lines all looked very good. I hope to actually fire the engine off in a week or two now.

FYI......I took one of those mini-camera movies with the digital camera and tried to post it here, BUT no luck. My computer skills are less than my mecahnical skills!!!! ha-ha. Any way, it would have showed the gauge nearly pegged out at 58 lbs. (Don't know what my rpm's were on my 1/2 " drill)

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No issues with the routing of the mufflers was encountered today when the pipers were installed around the full-flow oil works on my '55 400.

Another step closer to driving this beast!

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Kevin:

Awesome work by your muffler guy! I am impressed.

Craig

It's alive! My 5587 roared to life today. All systems seem to flowing fine & more updates to follow. After 1/2 hour of running the engine in the garage, I was getting 35lbs oil pressure at the new gauge in the engine bay. The port I used for the gauge was installed where the old by-pass oil filter previously was fastened (left front side of block).

Congratulations!! looks and sounds like a great job.

Just out of curiousity what all did u do to the engine when it was apart???? New rings, pistons and bore???? New rod and main bearings or what??? Was it bored to a 374????

Keith,

Yes. Bored to 374ci, with new pistons and new bearings all the way around. Most truthfully, that was my first rodeo at ever rebuilding an engine but I did rebuild it with my own hands. I dropped my old engine off in Las Vegas and I contracted with Craig to disassemble & have it machined in late 2005. I then spent 1 full week in Pahrump in May 2006 actually putting it together. Craig stood with me and step by step I turned the wrenches to build her. It was at that time too that we plumbed the full-flow oil system that all of you here developed from some of those expansive & exhaustive on-line chats of old.

I also had the exhaust manifolds coated by performance coating (of Seattle I think) and I've placed an electric wiper system into here too. I need to review my notes a bit to see what else I did. It's been (4) years of "weekends only" to get it to this point.

Here's a couple of pictures. Transporting to Las Vegas and present day.

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Kevin: Nice job on your Packard

John F. Shireman

I did however discover that I'm weeping a wee bit of oil from the full flow filter's return line connection. The line returns from the filter (see picture) carrying oil to the block near where the oil pressure switch is typically positioned. As seen, the orientation was very 'touch & go' back there. I've lost track of how many times that assembly had to be repositioned. (And then ultimately getting the distributor in there proved challenging too).

Anyway.......move forward progress again.

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