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Okay, so the car's waiting on the transporter, should be here in two weeks. Got my reprint Packard service manual in today, not a word in that big phone book about adjusting the rear shocks.

Somebody cranked the rear shocks too stiff, car is sitting high in the rump almost like it has air shocks on it. Are these like Model A shocks where you just back off the center nut a little at a time until you get the ride and stance you want?

Sorry to ask such a dumb question. Thanks!

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The shocks do not hold the car up, they merely dampen motion. The car is too high as the springs are not correct. You will have to get other springs, take a leaf or two out these springs, or install lowering blocks between the axle and the springs. Or someone installed something waaaaaaay wrong.

I don't know what's going on with it. I have photos of it from about ten years ago and it was sitting nice and level, and that was after the weird paint restoration it has. Now the rear end is way up in the air - I was figuring somebody just cranked up the shocks.

I suppose will figure it out when the car gets here, but, it was sitting nice and level, then, this happened for some reason. Weird. Thanks!

Maybe it is blocked in a high position. An acquaintance used to raise the rear of bodies of some of the cars he moved when he loaded them on his trailer -- similar to the way that car looks. His reasoning was on most cars the axle was hard to get to and by raising the body he didn't have to struggle as much in getting far under the car when chaining the rear down to the fastening points on his trailer -- which I do remember as being fairly far in. On other cars it was most likely to prevent the tail end from hitting the ground as he placed it on the trailer.

He had a Tee like arrangement that could be inserted on a floor jack in place of the regular saddle. The cross on the Tee was long enough to span the bumper support bars so he could raise the rear of the body up a few inches while the axle stayed still. He then had some kind of adjustable posts that sort of worked like jackstands only with a curved saddle piece on each end and would put those between the frame kick up and the axle to keep the body raised while he removed the floor jack and Tee. Don't remember if there was anything to keep those supports in place other than being jammed in position but the method seemed to work well.

Too bad he never figured out something like that for the front ends because I know for a fact a lot of cars -- 51-6 Packards in particular -- managed to have their stabilizer bar supports damaged when he chained down the front ends. I suppose the reason for that was whatever he used for a chain fastener didn't fit around bumper bars or A arms but did go easily around stabilizer supports.

Still spit balling because the car isn't here yet, but, it appears to be the rear leaf spring shackles. Looked at the video of it I was sent today, again, and the rear shackles are pointing almost straight up and down.

Looking at other Packards of this vintage, the shackles slant well towards the rear, so, I suspect this is the problem, the shackles are pushing the rear springs too far forward and thus causing them to lift the car's rump. Although why anybody would've done this, is anybody's guess!

I'd question if the car has the correct rear springs.

My best guess: Those are supposed to tension shackles. I have noticed that when those early cars are lifted by the frame and the axle drops the shackles pull toward the front to an almost horizontal position. It would not take very much at all for them to flip over center as the car came down and voila, you now have compression shackles and the car is sitting very high in the back. You just need to jack it up and flip them back.

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I think you're onto something! Thanks, that makes sense. As I said, in the older photos of the car, it was sitting normal, this high stance just occurred somewhere in the last ten years. I'll let ya' know once it gets here! Thanks!