Packard Forum Index » V-8 (1955-56)

My buddy and I may have discovered the ultimate 55 Clipper. It appeals to everything in my contrarian nature. Sadly it was wrecked and rusted almost beyond recognition but still yielded some great parts and some arcane information.

Someone ordered a black 55 Clipper Deluxe with a blue interior. The car had only two options: oil filter and oil bath air filter. No Torsion Level. No radio. No heater. 3 spd, no overdrive, and no "Clipper Convenience Group" the only car I've ever seen without it, therefore no trunk light and no backup lights.

I'll include a pic of the dash--note no heater knobs, only vent knobs--and of the blanking plates.

This car would have weighed 3700 lbs according to the salesman's book, and would have been able to run circles around a Caribbean by dint of its light weight and 3.9 standard axle. What fun. Someone had about 122K miles of fun before it was rear ended. And the tree fell on it. She was 5522-8779, paint V interior 12. R.I.P.

Know of other strangely equipped cars?

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The missing heater levers sure stand out. Am surprised Packard would leave an open slot like that without putting in the levers and blocking them in a fixed position. Wonder if they might have been there originally and removed for parts when the car was wrecked. Also interesting is the knobs on the normal fan switch places. Usually cars without either heater option that I've seen had a blank triangular plate that filled the frame recess and held there by a stud & nut behind.

Ross, I'd think a post-mortem on a 122,000 mile Packard V8 engine would be interesting.

Ross,

Can we get a picture of the rear, I am trying to imaging what the '55 looks like without the backup light compared to how the '54s look.

The rear of the car was completely fwanged, but enough was visible to show no evidence of the large holes for the backups below the taillamps. I'm now 120 miles away, so sadly no more pictures. But Kev, you can walk out into your own garage if you want to see what a 55 without backups looks like. Just imagine an upper rail on the bumper. I always thought they were kind of ugly anyway and plan to remove them from my Constellation when its painted.

The fan switch blanks were the same ones that filled the holes when you didn't get a rear seat heater: small fixed knob over a blank plate. I really doubt anyone went under that dash to get the knobs AND the levers. A nasty job, and nothing on the rest of the car was missing.

Interesting, the manual brake MC was just behind the steering box, as on 51-54, not under the driver's heel as on TL manual brakes. The frame was EXACTLY like a 51-54 except for the front engine mounts, and even used threaded suspension bushings like a 51-52.

At a Packard show you can see a row of full optioned Caribbeans, but seldom a Deluxe. Somehow I gravitate toward them!

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HH56 said: Also interesting is the knobs on the normal fan switch places. Usually cars without either heater option that I've seen had a blank triangular plate that filled the frame recess and held there by a stud & nut behind.

Continuing on this line, a bit more trivia on these switches for (at least the late) 56 Caribbean convertibles. Factory build slips say only 1 or 2 of the very first cars had both heaters before Packard concluded the underseat heater was not compatible with the new Sunstrand reversible seat frame. On my Carib, a late car, both fan positions have the facia with the fan speeds, both have the knob (pointer), but only the right switch is functional; the left hand knob/pointer is stationary and fixed in the center, upright position. Can't say I've looked at earlier 5699s to see if they are done similarly but I'll begin to take notice.

Interesting variations. I've also seen the dummy knob as it was on my Caribbean before I decided to change to a switch and rear fan plate (which am not using)--but thought it was only on senior cars. There was a 55 relatively bare bones Clipper locally where a dummy knob was not there at all on underseat side--just a blank plate. Unfortunately no longer around to look at it again but am curios now.

Instead of the head end of "stud" for want of a better word being behind dash and stem protruding thru with the slotted nut holding the triangular plate and then the knob, this one was just the reverse. The conical recess in the plate was filled with a smoothed type head and (assume) a regular nut was in the back. Never looked that closely at the setup to see if possible but wonder if it was the same piece and could be reversed. Also am wondering if maybe it was early car and something changed in production because the blank only side did look rather plain and unbalanced. To my mind, almost as bad as just slots on the other side looks.

So what's the deal on the Mopar 440 long cross ram intake fitted on the Packard V-8???

Back in the 90's I restored a 56 Caribbean hardtop. It was an early model (number 9) and it had the underseat heater which worked fine, as did the seat. I was told by one "expert" that the problem with the underseat heater was only on the convertibles, so they cancelled it on all Caribbeans.

I wonder if part of the reason it was eliminated might also be that it was ugly since it was so exposed under the open frame. On the other models, it was well hidden under and behind that little toe kick piece of sheet metal but not so on the Caribbean. Randy posted a picture a while back of his friends car showing it in all it's glory. Lovely for the back seat passengers to look at and perfectly exposed for bored kids to kick or poke holes in the core.