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what yrs did Packard use 356 and is 356 same as 359 In 54 Packard patrician

The 356 was introduced for 1940 and last used in Packard cars in 1950; a version of it as a marine engine continued into 1951. The 359 is an entirely different engine, essentially a bored and stroked 9-main bearing 327.

G'day Ray Laliberte,
to PackardInfo, and I invite you to include your Packard in the Packard Owner's Registry.

are there no on block to distinguish what motor I have in My Packard

The easiest way to tell a 356 block from the later 288/327 is look at the distributor location. On the 356 block distributor is almost dead center directly under a freeze plug and the oil pressure sender and plumbing is forward of the distributor. On the 288/327 block the positions are reversed with distributor being forward of center between two freeze plugs and the oil pressure sender is behind directly under a freeze plug. I believe the distributor is also forward of center on the older 282 blocks used thru 1947 but someone else will have to confirm that.

As far as numbers, download the engine serial number guide and find your motor number. Looking at the chart and the range of numbers you can determine which engine and year of manufacture you have in case someone did an engine swap.https://www.packardinfo.com/xoops/html/downloads/PackardEngineSerials.pdf

Also checkout:https://packardinfo.com/xoops/html/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=16389&viewmode=flat&order=ASC&type=&mode=0&start=0
Wes