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The spacer is metal about 7/16" thick with a gasket at either end. You should probably mark it with a punch or indelible ink so that when the solenoid comes off you will know which way it went on as I have found it is sometime difficult to know which way it goes with the limited room and visibility.

Had a bit of time this weekend, so back to work on the OD.

I pulled the solenoid (not an easy task) and tested it by grounding and connecting #4 terminal. It "machine guns" (more like jackhammers) but does not stay out.
I can't tell if that is the noise I would hear earlier when the car's speed would trip the Governor, but it is suspicious.
I assume that this could mean that the "Hold in" winding is failing, but I would like to test this separately. I am looking at the schematic (not really my thing), can I simply charge terminal #3 without damaging anything, and will that pop out the plunger and hold it in place?
I am not sure that the "machine gunning" should really affect the OD operation unless it is not holding the plunger out long enough for the pawl to engage the sun gear. Once that happens, it seems like the sun gear holds the pawl in and wouldn't require the solenoid to push the plunger any longer. Most recently, the car would not drop into OD.
I don't think the solenoid looks particularly bad (I have included a couple pictures) although the pull-in contacts are worn.
I do note as I operate this by hand, that the "ground out" contacts appear never to open. As the solenoid sits, the plunger is up (in) and pushes the bottom of the ground out contacts upward which closes them. When I move the plunger down (out) the points all drop down (as the plunger no longer contacts the bottom point of the set), the top also comes down, still maintaining a solid contact at the points (unless the plunger itself is required to complete the connection).
There is also a fair amount of travel from the disengagement of the ground out point set by the plunger top, to the point that the pull-in contacts are opened by travel of the plunger. Is this proper?
I have an early Plymouth with BW OD, the solenoid is a bit different, but the top points do not stay permanently closed.

As always, all help is appreciated as I am out of my element here.

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In order to test and prevent the machine gunning, you have to energize terminals 3 and 4 at the same time. The power at 4 will allow the pull in and when pull in contacts open, the power at 3 will be there for hold coil to keep it in. This is essentially the way it is wired in normal operation by circuitry in the relay. Easiest way to do this is get a short piece of wire long enough to connect both terminals together and then to your power source. Needs to be reasonably heavy --14 ga at least. After it is energized properly and stays out, then look at your contacts and see if they are still as you mentioned.

OK, I was able to perform the test wiring together the #3 and #4 terminals and the plunger pops out and stays out. Additionally, I connected only to #3 and manually pulled out the plunger and it stayed out once pulled out completely.
Looking more closely at the manual, it looks like the I was confusing the "insulator" over the points for the indicator light with the ground out contacts. So, I gather the indicator light contacts are the plunger top and points on the large spring arm, and the other arm above that point set is some sort of insulator, although it definitely looks like a set of points. But, my light has always extinguished once the OD is engaged.
So, I think the solenoid is operating as it should.
While this is out, are there any other tests I should perform on it or the car to help determine the problem?
I would like to systematically go through the OD electrical switches and circuits to move through each system and locate the issue. Is there a manual out there that will help with that process? There is a good thread in the post-war forum, but the terminals, etc. are not similar enough for me (because I don't know what I am doing) to follow it through. It seems like there must be a reference manual for the electrical part of this system.

The only reference I'm aware of is the Econodrive training manualhttps://www.packardinfo.com/xoops/html/downloads/EconoDriveTrainingBook.pdf which you probably have. The section on electrical operation gives a breakdown of what each component does but nothing on point to point like the electromatic book gave you. There may be a service letter with a few snippets but nothing really detailed.

Part of the problem with checking electrical point to point is the car has to be in motion to see if OD actually works. When sitting, you can ground the governor and listen for solenoid and then push accelerator or move the lockout lever to see if it releases, but that's about it. Even that might not help because if OD is not in a mechanical position to accept full travel of solenoid pawl, any further checks that relied on full engagement might not be valid. It is also not a good idea to keep R9 solenoid sitting part way with pull in winding energized for a long period that the tests might take because of the possibility of overheating it.

HH56,
Previously when I was trying to track down the buzzing noise, you offered the following:
"You could follow the procedure in econo drive manual to pull the solenoid, leave everything connected but ground the solenoid case (a heavy wire & tight connection or maybe a jumper cable) then energize everything by grounding the OD wire at governor. The plunger should snap out one time, and stay. Moving the gas pedal to kickdown position should drop everything out and if governor still grounded, releasing gas will cause it to snap out again."

I tried this last nite, but when I ground the OD at the governor, I get no reaction whatever from the solenoid (it was fully grounded), but I do hear a lighter clicking, which is coming from the OD relay. I am beginning to think that this may be a wiring issue. The wires are in a harness throughout most the car, so it is really hard to actually trace them, but the exposed portions around the OD solenoid are fairly worn with the insulation clearly cracked in places.

Because of the machine gunning noise, I am suspecting that maybe the wire powering terminal #3 might be bad, which may have started the problem (would this affect the solenoid operation upon grounding the governor?). The last symptom I had was the OD simply not even trying to engage when the OD light went on and I released the accelerator. Since the fuse is good (at least I assume so since the EC is working)and the solenoid appears to be working properly, I am thinking I should run a couple 14 gauge wires from the #3 and #4 terminals on the solenoid to the #3 and #4 terminals on the relay. No harm in that, right? Then repeat the test. Because the EC is working, I am also assuming the wiring to the governor is OK, but I guess that is to the wrong side.

One other thing that bothers me a bit. The owners manual calls for a 30 amp fuse for the OD. When I replaced the blown one a few weeks back, it was a 20 amp fuse. It was probably the next time I attempted to use the OD that it finally went dead. Could the larger amp fuse have caused already fragile wiring to fail? Also, could the 20 amp have contributed to the machine gunning effect?

As always, all the help and guidance is very much appreciated.

The EC has a separate fuse so other than also getting ground at the governor, it is totally independent.

With machine gunning, it's possible the #3 wire is bad or also possible there is a problem in relay. Since solenoid worked properly with 3 & 4 connected on bench, that tends to lead that way. The 20 amp fuse wouldn't have caused it--just blown when it was doing it.

There was a modification in late 40's to add a safety switch to open the hot wire when in reverse. It may have also been done to your car so that would be a good thing to check.

Terminal 1 of the relay should have power at all times if no switch was added and at all times except when in reverse if it was. Using your test light with one side to ground, check that terminal and see if power present--If later switch used, it was operated by reverse lever so also wiggle the gearshift when checking other gears & make sure not mis-adjusted. If that is OK, then if the governor is grounded you should also have a light at terminal 4 and 3. If so, relay is good and would try the external wires. Just use some wire approx the size of the ones in loom and make sure if solenoid not mounted, that is has a good solid ground of at least same size wire bolted to mounting hole and frame ground.

If power is at 1 but not 3 & 4 with governor grounded, then need to check the wiring and the lockout, & kickdown switches coming into terminal 5.

An added note: I don't know the particulars of your loom but just remembered there was also a bulletin in later years about the overdrive harness. The black connectors where a short loom containing the 6 wires from governor and solenoid joined the main loom having poor connections was the issue. If your loom is 2 piece constructed the same way with those connectors, might be worth a look.

HH56,

Great info. Thanks so much. I will test this further tonight.

Jim

JIm

I recently took a long (400 mile) drive with my car ( 1950 Eight w/ R11). After about 100 miles, my generator quit charging so I was running on the battery. I continued until about a half hour after dark when I REALLY ran the battery down. The car ran fine, but after about 2 hours it started jumping in and out of overdrive, with no apparent pattern . If I slowed down about 15 mph it would re-engage.

This has not happened since I had the charging system fixed. The OD seems to to take a lot of juice. Check the voltage of your battery and the output of your generator

Regards


John Harley

JHH,

I know the generator output is good as we tested that when we sorted out some of the systems after buying the car. The battery tested good, but is a couple years old. I do keep it on a trickle charger, but I think that may also be a good place to look.

Thanks