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

Quote:Gary,

In the '54 Photo Archive found some pic's of Packards with light green paint.

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Heres some from the Packardinfo pics, 48 cream and 51 white. the white leather seats from a 48 convertible.

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back seat from 48 super eight convertible

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Mal, that light green not so bad on a convertible. Looks like a Orchard Green ? I think the closet Packard ever did to mint green.

Mal, In austrailia, how do you find driving your packard? On those dusty roads there(countryside), i guess you use radial tires ?

Also, do you keep to origional color, even though you strip complete frame? I know proffessional restorers dip there car frame, check quality of frame, then prime and paint.

This is the color iI was origionaly thinking of, a mint green, this one from a 1948 Chrysler Windsor Convertible.
I quit like that Orchard Green you posted Mal.

Of all Colors it will come down to

Mint Green
White
Packard Ivory
Orchard Green


Every inch of paint will be removed, inside and out. So dashboard no problem. I want to injoy this car, so I will pick one of these colors mentioned.

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Quote:Gary,

Street and Highway driving is fine, even though my '41 120 Coupe is LHD in a RHD environment. Have turn indicators installed as well as a mirror either side to assist the driver with visibility. I try to avoid dirt roads although on our recent National Rally when following a Packard navigating using a GPS he led a couple of us along a dirt road for several miles! My tyres are Diamondback WWW radials and I'm very pleased with them, except for the cost!

My coupe has been repainted twice in it's lifetime, went from white, to off-white and it's now cream which I've left for now because it's quite presentable. I didn't remove the body from the frame when we did the various mechanical rebuilds but did remove the front clip(grill/bonnet/mudguards). Have scraped frame and underside of body and cleaned then repainted. Wouldn't recommend doing it that way, so if you can do a body off restoration that definitely is the way to do it.

Have you found it easy, Mal, to get your spare parts in Austrailia? Including 6 volt stuff ? And lastly, when painting engine, how many Tins of Paint does it take?

You said you changed body color many times, did you keep seats original color? Or change to match your body color?

Quote:My spare and replacement parts came from a number of sources:
1 - Packard Parts vendors like Kanters, Max Merritt and others.
2 - eBay, it's amazing what can be found there.
3 - Members of our club, Packard Automobile Club of Australia, have been able to help out at times from parts they've acquired over the years.
4 - Modern or other parts which interchange or can be modified to suit.
The 6 Volt system works very well. I have replaced the wiring harness, the starter motor and generator have been checked and cleaned and I use an Optima battery. Accordingly I have no trouble in recommending 6 Volt be retained. Although with our hot summers my wife wishes it was equipped with air conditioning, but to do that would require much more than just converting to 12 Volt, that's the "easy" part in many respects. The hard part for me would be fitting the a/c equipment to the engine and inside the car.
To paint the engine/bellhousing/trans/overdrive it took about 1/2 litre of paint and I brushed it on. Turned out real well!

Quote:Sorry, I didn't make myself clear about the body colour changes. I've only owned the Coupe for about 3 years since I bought it off eBay from Idaho in the US. One of the previous owners before me, a Packard collector who owned it for 46 years, did the repaints the last of which was about 15 years ago. That same owner also reupholstered it about 20 years ago and retained original colours and materials in doing so.

With so much work done on it Mal, it must have been a very solid car?

Body is good, only one small rust through needed to be addressed. Interior is good but after 20 years the front seat upholstery needs attention again. Mechanically, although the Coupe ran, steered and stopped, it required a whole lot of work to bring it to to scratch. Don't know if previously I referred you to my Project Blog thread where the detail is contained relating to what work was done? Since then the work is ongoing as other matters come up and need to be addressed or things not done earlier are caught up with.