Packard Forum Index » V-8 (1955-56)

Took a twilight drive this evening as it's about 80F here in otherwise frigid Boston. About 1/4 mile home my dash and headlights went out.

I played with the dash switch (in and out a few times) and the dimmer as well. Achieving no illumination, I pushed in the switch and as I was pulling into my garage - gave it a try and voila - dash and headlamps again.

The fuse appears to be fine - curious if there is any sort of secondary overheat circuit breaker or just the Universe telling me playtime was over?

If the car is stock there are no fuses involved with those lights. A circuit breaker on the end of the headlight switch provides the protection for the head, park, and tail lights and since dash lights are fed from the tail light terminal, those too.

The breakers are self resetting and as they age they tend to lose capacity and could be the issue. New ones can be purchased at most parts stores and may be a good first step if there is no obvious sign of another problem. Can't remember if you were the one with a no high beam light issue a couple of weeks ago but if so, suspect you have a different issue.

Typical normal operation is a short will cause the breaker to open, stay off for a few seconds and reset only to trip immediately again. This will repeat until the switch controlling the item is turned off or short is fixed or power feeding breaker is turned off. If breaker has lost capacity it will just trip randomly but still resets and may stay on for awhile before tripping again.

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As always, thank you very much!

Sounds like a breaker issue as the linear part of the switch tends to be robust (the rotary switch tends to have problems). See the left top nut in Howard's picture? If you move the connection to the stud below it you will bypass the breaker. But first, install a 10 amp inline fuse, and be sure to carry extras in case they are needed. That's why it uses a circuit breaker, so you're not stuck without lights until you find or buy a fuse. Pretty sure replacement breakers are also available if you look hard enough as they would have been pretty standard in the day.

For what it’s worth, I had a similar headlamp cut out happen to me in my 1955 Caribbean on the way home from a parade and post party.

I found that the root cause was the headlamp harness that goes from the junction blocks on the fender splasher, passes through the radiator core support, and then through a hole in the fender, splasher, so that it can connect to the back of the headlamp.

The rest of the wiring in our cars is plastic coated, but Packard chose to reuse the same cloth covered harness whose part number goes back to the 1941 Clipper. The problem is that the cloth becomes brittle and fragile as it ages, a condition that is not helped by the fact that the forward part of the harness is not protected by an inner fender or wheelhouse liner. Further, this harness passes over several raw sheet metal edges that can wear away at the old and weakened fabric.

I found that my headlamp harnesses were shorting out against these sheet metal edges under certain conditions. The fix was to purchase reproduction harnesses from Max Merritt.https://www.parts123.com/parts123/yb.dll?parta~dyndetail~Z5Z5Z50000022e~Z5Z5Z54101~P65.00~~~~S6RA0MCWGG18514199966b~Z5Z5Z5~Z5Z5Z50000022E

My headlamp switch and breaker had been functioning as designed, I just needed to address the root cause that was making them trip.

Hope this helps!

On my '54 Clipper, where the harness passes through that sheet metal area near the radiator, I enlarged that hole slightly so I could install a rubber grommet.

When I pulled all the stock wiring out of the '54, there were multiple spots where the insulation was worn down or compromised by it passing over/through sheet metal areas with no protection.

So, I tried to rectify that for my own piece of mind.

I've had aged breakers cycle off only when headlights are on bright. They usually get worse, never better. I'd inspect wiring, looking closely at trouble spots as discussed above, and replace the breaker with a new one.

This makes sense as my low beams are useless - so i used bright - and they cut out just before i pulled into my driveway.

I'm sending the car out for a major refurbishment (as it was completely restored in 2007) - so I'll have those good people tackle that and everything else. I appreciate your and everyone's input.