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As the heat riser spring warms, the counterweight should drop down.

Thanks, Dave.
I have a lot of confidence that things were put together correctly. The trip to Pebble Beach, 2000 mi. RT, found me rolling at 70 most of the way back (I went by the coast going down from Portland). And it was hot coming back.
I was pushing it on some of those long, long climbs in the Mt. Shasta area and southern Oregon.

We'll make sure everything is in there right, especially a good seal on all the valves.

ATF was suggested to help lubricate the valves. I suppose it's like Mystery Oil.

Judging by the spring, the counterweight looks like it's all the way down (as far as it would go counter clockwise). But I think when I took this, the engine was cold. Hmmm

The Duchess' '47 356 engine is in the shop at Central Cylinder Head in Portland. They recently finished my son John's 1962 Corvette engine. John is honchoing the cooling system and engine update.

The pistons and rings (40) and mains (20) have arrived from JD at Max Merrit. Jerry, Central's owner, ordered the rest from Egge, who could not provide the rest for another month or two.

Besides a new radiator core by Mac's Radiator in Salem and water pump rebuild by Automotive Friction in Damascus, we're pulling the heater because the motor's bearing needs to be replaced. The distributor is also being rebuilt at Philbin Electric in Portland.

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On a certain person's recommendation, I will be using RedLine lead substitute and regular gas in the Duchess after the engine rebuild. I have a case already at $10 a bottle/tank. There are only a couple of gas stations nearby who sell gas without ethanol, but I will use them that as well, though the gas available may be premium and not regular. Stainless steel seats did not prevent my valves from burning up. This time I'm not taking any chances because I want to continue to drive the Duchess a lot. ..with all 8 cylinders.

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Update on '47 356 Packard engine rebuild.
Two of the mains have issues. Note gauge is in the red.
The mainline was checked before the crank was ground.
Then after it's been align-honed, Randy) put the bearings in to verify correct bearing thickness & clearances.

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Block grind.

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I'm not a machinist, and I'm not sure what this means, but...
We've had a LOT of 356 engine rebuilds done, and the one person who was finally able to "get it right" told us that the crankshaft MUST BE bored straight With the block. Otherwise the bearings wear out quite quickly.

Perhaps only another machinist would understand this.

1. Central Cylinder Head in Portland, where the Duchess' engine is being rebuilt, resizes the first connecting rod to what the factory specs are.
2. They mic the crankshaft and put the bearing in the first connecting rod to check the vertical oil clearance.
3. Then they take the rest of the rods to that same housing bore size.
This gives them a range between .0005 - .0025.
Notice they have set these up @ .0015.

They give .001 allowance on crankshafts & connecting rods for size.

This is why they put the bearing in the rod, so they know the exact clearance they want to achieve. No guess work this way.

Finally an amusing observation: A Packard 356 Rod next to a '48 flathead Ford V8 239

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Rotating the crank assembly athttp://www.mktx.com/packard/RotateCrank.MOV

Frustrated this morning. The "completed" engine was picked up and is in Salem with my son, so I can't look at it. But I'm told one of the outer (longer) manifold studs is broken and my son asked if I could get a new one.

Checking the parts book where I could not find a listing for the Block (the engine section starts by listing the camshaft), which I thought was weird. Didn't anyone need to order a replacement block?

Anyway I found the section for the manifolds. No studs are listed in intake or exhaust, only machine screws listed in the exhaust section (shared with the intake manifold).

There are 3 #300136, which is listed Nowhere in the 50.003 machine screw utility item section, and 3-#7243 listed in 50.003 which are 3/8" - 16/in thread, 1-1/8" long hex-head machine screws.

Question 1: Since there's no listing for 300136, is the 1-1/8" 7243 the longer or shorter of the two sizes.

What's also weird to me is that the nuts are 3/8 ID, 7/16 OD, 13/32 thick 24/in thread. And listed as BRASS. Son says these need to be Grade 8 steel.

Question 2: If there are no studs associated with the manifold (except the 4 holding the carburetor) why are the nuts listed 24 threads/in? Are they for the carburetor only?

Son John says that the rebuilt '47 356 engine and the '40 356 engine both have studs for the manifolds, not machine screws. As soon as he gets home from work he'll remove and measure the good outer stud.

Question 3: Should we replace the studs with 16-thread machine screws?

Help here would be much appreciated, especially in using the Parts Book if I'm doing it wrong. - Joe