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Hank,

A question about your u-bolts. Is there only one per side? Reason I ask is that the pic of the left side shows a groove where one was on diagonally while the pic of the right side show a u-bolt in position that way. If it came like that, and that's how it should be then fine. But if it should have two per side and you've only put one on to move the diff around please enlighten me.

Things are looking good.

one per side, they go on diagonally.

worked on my car last night with my dad. good ole dad time. even my wife and son came out to join in on the fun. my son was in awe of what we were doing and then about 2 minutes later asleep. LOL!!

my dad and i rebuilt the torsion motor and yes IT WORKS!!! ;0) i tested it with the electric motor mounted and it turns VERY good! it looks like it just came off the show room floor. that eastwood chassis paint is a gift from God. great strong stuff!

getting those gears to line up right in the box was okay until the last stage went in, but leave it to my dad to get it done with out an explicit remark ;0)

gave it a good wipe down and i swear it looks like it came right out of the factory floor to be installed. ;0)

enjoy the crappy pic as my good camera had dead batteries and all i had was my cell phone. i will take better pics later.

also i mocked up the solenoids, they are not attached yet as i am waiting on the wiring wrap and liquid electric tape i ordered from eastwood so that i can hook the harness up and seal it to the torsion cutoff switch and the paint it with the plastic paint. that is why it is still silver and nothing is bolted up yet.

sorry for the crappy pics but, enjoy.

Hank

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Looking good. Out of curiosity, regarding the motor armature bouncing the 1/4 inch. Was the bearing shot or the retainer clip out of position?

bearing was frozen and as a result i think that was what took the clip off the end of the worm gear when i start moving it after so many years. when i took the cap off the clip was just floating around in there. when i tested it yesterday night the worm gear stayed in place fine.

as a result of the clip falling off.....i was able to reuse the plug ;0) so good news there ;0)


now it works flawlessly. ;0)

Really looks good, Hank. It's very interesting to see the insides of what I was riding on those days. I only got a few weeks to look over of a stripped '55 Custom chassis a out thirty-five years ago. All the detail shots are going to be helpful to a lot of current owners, and fascinating for the rest of the forum members.

Do you have an ETA for the body drop? Meanwhile, keep hammering away. You're good at it.

hey thanks man! really helps to keep me encouraged! body wont be going back on until i get the chassis finished. then the drivetrain is next....then body, etc....

i also found an old autoparts store in arlington texas, that is awesome! i called them today and they looked to see what kind of pinion seal would fit my packard and while he did not have one in stock he told me the National Seal product number was 11079....called Oreilys autoparts and wouldn't you know they have one in stock. the old autparts guy said that it showed to fit all 55 packard....nothing for 54 and 56 though...but i am sure that 54 would be the same, don't know about 56 though since they changed up the differential a bit.

i will go and get the part and let you guys know if it is correct or not....if so i will add it to the x-reference parts page.

got the electric motor repaired on the torsion drive....but i don't think they did anything more than paint and clean it...i am going to call them back and complain and will probably never use them again.


later,

Hank

well, apparently the guy at oriely's was mistaken, i knew it was too good to be true. anyways there national seal book only listed for 57-58 Packard...i thought, why not try....i knew it wouldn't work and it did not. so don't try if you are going to.

you don't want to know what it took to get the old pinion seal out....it was REALLY in there. it was the original part number too...so it may have been the original from day 1, although i would think that would be doubtful, but possible i guess.

i guess i am just going to have to resort to the 40 dollar one on max merritt. ;0( and ;0) sad because of the price and happy because they have them.

got the torsion motor wiring harness re-wrapped with that special harness wrap. it was pretty easy actually. cleaned up the connectors on the bench grinder. it is ready to install and seal with the liquid electric tape. soon the torsion motor will be 100% done. the wrap is from eastwood and it was only 10 bucks for 2 rolls and i am pretty sure it will pretty much do the whole car!

i got the motor back from the repair shop and short of painting it and turning the copper end... they didn't do much...i was less then impressed. they must have not understood that i wanted it to look brand new, not just work. i didn't even bother to grip about it cause i knew i would not get anywhere with these people. so i took it upon myself to redo the motor myself. i took it apart and resealed the coils on the armature with scotchcoat from 3m, you can get it at lowes, basically it is a brown looking vanish type stuff.....don't breath it in....strong stuff....but i coated the coils with that stuff and it sealed them back up really nice . all water proofed. i will post some pics of that soon. cleaned up the rust on the top cap of the armature too. it looks WAY better now. i also re-oiled the armature bearing...which they did not do. then i repainted the housing with the nice satin chassis paint. that stuff is AWESOME paint....eastwood extreme stain chassis paint.

i should beable to put it back together tonight and mount it on the torsion gear box.

i tell you what is wearing me out is cleaning all the hardware on the bench grinder.....there is ALOT of washers and nuts and bolts to clean up so i can remount things like the solenoids, etc....

anyways....stay tuned for pics...i just need to recharge my camera's batteries.

later,

Hank

I second that on the Eastwood Chassis paint. I used the Gloss and Satin for everything I have done that was black on car. Except the radiator which I used their radiator black paint.

Why dont you just media blast all the bolts and hardware? I find that this does so much quicker job than using a benchgrinder and can get inside the nooks and crannies better. I just bought a wire mesh stainer used in the kitchen from a .99 cent store and put all the bolts in there. They I can hold onto it inside the cabinet with the blast gloves and shake the hardware around as needed. All the backing plate hardware shown in one of my last blog pictures was done this way.

No more shooting bolts across the garage from a slip on the bench grinder.

Hank,

I cross referenced the "11079" part # from my seal supplier and he gave me a new part # "3638". I ordered one to see what it looks like. It should be here this afternoon and I'll take a pic w/ measurements.