Packard Forum Index » Post-War (1946-54)

Quote:

Kev, are you sure you don't mean oil filter? I've never seen a bypass fuel filter.

On the '50 however, after removing the adjusting plug and the outside half of the ball seat, the ball stays in the cross-rod no matter how much I push, pull, squeeze, wiggle, rotate, twist, and swear. It isn't critical that I get it all disassembled, but I would really like to get the 57 years worth of black goo out and replace it with clean grease.


J.D. I recall having a similar problem with my 47 but I persisted and it finally came out. I am wondering if ever so slightly widening the extraction hole with say a Dremel tool might work.

Update on the Engine Noise. After driving the car (gently) around town off and on for a year while working on a number of other issues... The clacking noise did not go away. So I took the car to a mechanic where we removed the head and took out the #1 exhaust hydraulic lifter. It was very worn and had collapsed. The lifter body was hopelessly stuck in the lifter seat and the weakened lifter seat broke before the lifter would come out. So, pulled all the valves, and lifters, removed the camshaft and replaced the broken lifter seat. Since all the valves were out, had the valves and seats ground, cleaned the lifters and replaced seven out of sixteen lifter seats due to severe pitting on the flat surface riding the cam lobe. Had the head re-faced. Re-installed everything with lubriplate, new gaskets, etc. Started the engine and the clacking disappeared. When all the hydraulic lifters pumped up the engine was remarkably quiet.

Unfortunately, it was also running very rough. It appears that we are only running on cylinders 5-6-7-8. Cylinder 4 does fire when RPMS are increased well above idle. Removing the spark plug wire from cylinders 1-2-3 has no effect whatsoever... removing the wire from cylinder 4 at speed does slow the engine. Removing 5, 6, 7 or 8 will almost kill the engine.

New Distributor cap and rotor.
We have very good spark at all plugs.
We have fuel delivery (both barrels squirting merrily away).
The intake manifold is clear.
The (new) spark plugs show oily black for 1-2-3-4 and good firing for 5-6-7-8.

The mechanics diagnosis is that with the new head gasket, valve job and re-faced head we have aggrevated an existing problem with worn rings which I knew were marginal going in. They may be less than marginal. In fact I now suspect the car had 163,000 not 63,000 miles on it when I bought it. Anyway... the next step is to tear the rest of the engine down to see how much further we need to go to get the engine running properly.

As in Rings, Pistons?, Re-Bore?, Rod bearings?, Main bearings?, etc. etc. etc.

If anybody can come up with another reason for the firing problems... please feel free to chime in!

JD in KC,

Grief, dread, agony!!!

Hope you have been a GOOD BOY this year!!!

Your previous post of 356 engine parts and repairs gives you a LONG Christmas List to send Santa this year!!!

Should we just forward your last post to the NorthPole?

Seriously, sorry for the mechanical mayhem.
Your rebuild seems to have moved up a bit in the budget timeline.

Should have put your retirement stocks in to Packard Parts. I wish I had.

Here's Dan on his Packard

But IT IS STILL GREAT FUN!!!!

DanL

The Packard budget for this year (yes, I do have one) is totally hammered. I budgeted for the replacement of a single lifter, new WWW tires and some very minor body work. I have the new tires, so the body work will have to wait.

I'm not ready to throw myself on the Cormorant hood ornament yet. I figure I'm learning enough through this experience to tackle the engine in the '41 Limo mostly on my own. So I'm getting a late life education in engine rebuilding along with a (hopefully) smooth running '50 Packard.

I'll be watching carefully when the mechanic removes the ridge from the cylinders, plastigages the bearings, inspects the rings, measures the cylinder walls, pistons etc.l

-When life hands you lemons... make lemonade.

Quote:

I'll drink to that

The drama continues:

Removed the head and replaced the rings. Checked the connecting rod/main bearings while we were at it... they're fine. Replaced the head. And with great difficulty re-started the engine. Cylinders 1,2,3 still dead with little compression. So the problem wasn't the rings (although they were in need of replacement anyway). Apparently valves were being held open and this accounted for the lack of compression. It was at this point that it was recognized that the valve grinding should have been done with the benefit of a specialized gauge that fits down in the lifter body. I purchased the gauge and we removed the head (this is the 3rd time... you counting?) checked the clearance on all the valves and found several that were out of range, the range being .030-.070. So... replaced all valves that were over .060. In the end all valves had clearances between .045 and .055. We bled down (collapsed) all the hydraulic lifters before re-installation. Put the engine back together and started it up. It started almost instantly. You could hear the lifters pumping back up as they became silent one after the other.

The engine was still running rough. Guess what... cylinders 1,2,3 are now firing beautifully but 5,6, and 7 are dead (very low compression). We let the engine run for 20 minutes but no further changes were evident.

The lifters on 5,6, and 7 were returned exactly where they came from when the cylinders were firing. The valve clearance between the valve stems and lifter gauge are within range. All valves moved easily in their guides. Timing is fine, strong spark to all cylinders, new plugs.

We are pretty sure that the problem is valve(s) being held open. Does anyone know what might cause a lifter to over-pump causing a valve to remain open, or know how long it takes to bleed off the excess oil, or any other suggestions? I don't want to spend what's left of my 401k on head gaskets.

Lifters can't "overpump" and push the valve open, not enough hydraulic force to push the valve open against the valve spring. If I had to guess, I'd say either the cam lobe wasn't completely down before checking the stem to gauge clearance, or you either didn't keep the valves in the same order as they were removed, or didn't lap the seats on the valves you replaced.

Why not just do a thorough valve job by the book and be done with it?

Also when you replaced the rings, since the block wasn't bored you must check the ring end gap at the smallest portion of the bore. I don't see this as the cause of the problem unless you didn't and the rings immediately broke.

Quote:



Sorry for this opinion but I guess everyone has one. I don't know who the mechanic is but it seems obvious to me that he is the source of most of your problems. Hope he doesn't keep charging you to redo a job not so well done the first and sounds like maybe the second and third time.

Quote:

No, the guy is as unhappy as I am about the ongoing problems and stopped charging some time ago. I am going to let him try one more thing (which cannot make anything any worse) and if it doesn't fix the problem, I'll take the car back home and try to find another mechanic in the spring.

I'll keep y'all posted.