Anyone see a hotrod with a packard v8!?

Evidently this car is now for auction on eBay. Any thoughts about the BIN?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/e...akeTrack=true&ssPageName=VIP:watchlink:top:en

jack vines

 

It's nice but it's not a '32.

Packards have oiling issues, guys on the AACA board were working on that adapting a BBC oil pump and some other tricks to fix the weak spots.

 

Don't know what it's worth but I like it. Midwest channeled roadster, yes.

 

Big heavy engine that doesn't like to rev much. Expensive parts and some design flaws too. Different? Sure, but for what reason? As for V-12 and V-16 engines being used, well the value of the engine done right might well exceed that of the car as a whole. But again here comes that weight factor. A bare 32-39 Packard 12 block weighs the same as a complete ready to run SBC. Yes, I said BARE BLOCK as in ZERO internal parts and no heads or oil pan. Can't raise my rt hand to the wt of even a flathead Caddy 16, but I can ***ure you it too is quite heavy.

Sometimes if the reason is ONLY to be different then it's a pretty expensive statement in some of the cases presented. And if the literal term "hot rod" is actually the goal performance will be late to the party, and more often than not will receive a serious serving of ***whip should you decide to line em up with even the most common of V-8s available. Can anything be made fast? Sure it can but...

 

The car ran at WoS in 2010 and 11 I think with the Packard engine. Wasn't very fast. 155. But it was there and running with Packard power. Looking at the shirt right now. I guess it ran in 07 and 08. God how the years p*** by

 

No, not exactly. Whatever the AACA Board was doing, I haven't heard of it.

Yes, the Packard V8 did have OEM oiling issues, but we've pretty much solved them. I've got all the oiling system upgrades and a few Packard V8 speed parts on the shelf. FWIW, the kit uses an Oldsmobile oil pump. The BBC turns the wrong way to work in a Packard V8.

Is that describing an early hemi or the Packard? FWIW, the Packard V8 has about the same displacement range as the early Chrysler hemi and weighs less. No one seems to have an issue about the weight and expense of a hemi in a roadster. Your build, your money, your decision.

jack vines

 

I know mine Sounded cool ...

 

Having run both a Hemi and the Packard in my Vega (along with a GMC, a Pontiac and a 460 Lincoln) I did not find Packard parts any more expensive than Hemi parts. You do need to be resourceful. It's no 1-800-RACEMOTOR deal. I ran an Olds oil pump in mine. No big deal. Jack will be happy to sell you the adapter. And look at Jacks blown Packard. Tell me that's not a cool engine you would love to have in a roadster.

 

It's been a board upgrade and several years since I read up on what the guys over there had done to upgrade them but I know it invovled a little machining and some other tricks to make it work.

 

In Australia Rod Hatfield built a 55 Chev with a Merlin and sold it to a collector here in the States.

He then built a Salt Laker from a Packard limo ch***is running a Rolls Royce Meteor ( out of a centurion tank) which is basically a Merlin minus the superchargers. Coach built body in polished alloy looked beautiful. It is called the Warman Special and won Street Machine of the Year in Australia a few years ago.

 

I always like it when someone who has read several posts about Packards is telling the guy who sells the oil pump kit, what's in it. Think 455 type Olds. Or just generally tells someone who has been building and running Packards for decades and someone else who has built and run one on the salt what they are all about. Want to tell us about Chrysler lifters and rod bolts? How about Ford top loaders and Packard bellhousings? There is a lot to learn by doing. Less by reading about somebody else doing.

 

We built a 392 ci Packard for a 7 liter race hydro in the 60's.
Hilborn, Hunt, dry sump oil etc.
On 20% nitro it was very compe***ive and won many races.
The owner even tried to qualify it in the unlimited cl*** one year.
Came within one mph of making it.

 

I have an issue with it. Don't really want one. For the record, I didn't say it can't be done. You can take a Kill Devil 4cyl and double it's output, but at the end of it all you're in a vegetable juice commercial.

At the core of this is that dangerous line of thought. D I F F E R E N T.

Not that it's completely wrong or 100% useless it's generally an expensive exercise that usually doesn't net the desired power unless your pockets are a bottomless pit of $$$$$. To say less is pure denial. I won't bother to qualify how long I've been exposed to Packard engines nor how many I've tuned and spun wrenches on. It's been a substantial amount of my lifetime as several here already know.

Now if I were to pick a Packard for a hot rod I'd go for 327 or 356-359 straight 8. It would also be in a light fenderless car with tall gears and OD. Long legs and abundant TQ without too much effort. Durability is a given with those too as long as you don't plan to emulate the rev counts of an Offy with it. Just sayin...

 

Let's try this one more time. I was repeating what I remembered off the top of my head from reading something like five or even ten years ago on another forum when I read up on the pros and cons of running a Packard V8. I even admitted it's been a long time and I might not have it right. I don't know what more you need - I presume anyone interested in running one will look into it on their own. I have no intention of running one, so I don't particularly give a **** anymore. There's no reason to be an ***hole about it.

 

I went back and read your posts #32 and #39. Missed the part about how you might be wrong. Guess that's how I got the idea it sounded like you were telling Jack what he sells............HIGHLANDER- I didn't run the Packard to be different. I did it because I got a free one all apart. And I like learning things. It's OK to parrot what "everybody" knows. But I think it's more fun to dive in and see for your self. I would say most people would dismiss the idea of a Plymouth banger with a Y block Ford head in a race car. Or a flathead Plymouth banger with a homemade head running in V4F with the SCTA. Still if you had a rule book you might see Rich Fox holds the Muroc V4/GMR record with a 32 Ply/57 Ford combo in a small blue roadster. And when Hop Up Magazine promoted the V4F cl***es at El Mirage you might find the first guy who went over 100 and got a shirt was the same Rich Fox and the same blue roadster. I could go on about the twin Corvair turbo 270 GMC. People knew that wouldn't work. Still holds a record35 years after it first set one at Bonneville. You are welcome to run a crate motor. jack will sell you a crate Packard, in fact. I would rather do what I do. Different strokes.

 

Getting way OT here, but I understand why. We guys who build the lunatic fringe engines can be a bit difficult some time. The smaller and weirder the engine, the more defensive.

At present, I'm at the Studebaker International Meet. You do not want to piss off the Champion flathead six-cylinder guys by mentioning a 170" flathead might have some performance and durability limitations in a 3,500# car or a 5,000# big truck. Their hero is the Salt2Salt team who got a turbo car up to maybe 135 MPH at Bonneville three or four years ago.

Every ugly baby has a momma somewhere who loves it.

jack vines

 

Hey Rich, no harm no foul. I thought this was an opinion post and expressed mine. For the record I'm more an OHV Caddy or Nailhead guy. The Hemi mystique never hit me, and I've spent the majority of my career restoring Packard Cl***ics, so it's a brand I happen to be quite fond of. I also recall someone going really fast with an inline Packard on the salt (Arias?). He was having trouble with main bearing durability when we were talking about it there in 91. If you were there (you probably were) I was the guy who showed up for a day with the restored 34 V-12 Vicky in the trailer and my new bride.

Now get that wedgie outta there...

 

"Yeah, but the Commander 6 has the beef, build it right and it'll make that little Champ coffeegrinder puke rods trying to stay up with it".

There, that oughta do it

 

No harm experienced. Some times i get a little testy. But you have to realize that your post pretty much implied that I wasted 3 years on something dumb. I know you didn't think that or even know who i am or what i drive. Now i am fooling with a '56 Lincoln with Hilborn injection. Pretty much the same deal as the Packard. I like doing dumb stuff. I think the car you are thinking of was Bruce Crower's modified roadster with a Nash straight eight. Bruce was building a 9 main Packard engine for it with a 4 valve DOHC head. But got distracted. Dave Dozier had a '39 Chrysler flathead eight in his 'liner and went 250. And there are always Buick eights there. Lots of dumb stuff on the salt.

 

Yes, Bruce Crower. I had forwarded his contact info to a guy here in Motown that had a couple spare 359s. But damn that was 22yrs ago. That was a great day. Was on my way back from Pebble and just had to spend a day there. Taped Teagues 431MPH blast from atop a motorhome that some very nice gents were gracious enough to share with us.

IMO, if it's on the salt it ain't dumb. Thanks for the convo bud...

 

I doubt you will ever see a hot rod Frankin V-12. They didn't build very many of them. Somebody did build a Franklin Phaeton with a V-12 in the 70's.

The cool think about an air-cooled hot rod is that it could have really unique front styling. There would be nothing preventing you from running down the road just like this with no grill shell at all. The grills put on Franklin cars wer fake, just to make them look like everything else with a radiator.

More on this build at http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=799746&highlight=reo&showall=1

 

----------------
From what I understand the oiling
issue was mostly on the first year
- 1955 - version of the Packard V8
and was caused by the fact that they
had a vacuum pump for operating
the windshield wipers integral with
the oil pump. Supposedly the bottom
steel plate separating the pressure
side of the oil pump and the integral
vacuum pump was too thin and
would warp or crack, causing an
internal oil leak, resulting in a loss or
drop in oil pressure. The problem was
supposedly fixed by the factory on the
later 1956 model engines. It's a shame
that this was a brand new engine that
Packard had spent a huge amount of
money- (including hundreds millions
more in borrowed money that
Packard could ill-afford, to build a
brand new, state of the art, engine
plant to m*** produce it) - developing
much too late and then out of dire
necessity, rushing it into production
before it was fully perfected and had
all the bugs worked out of it. Worse for
Packard too, was after spending all this
money on it, it was only was produced
for two model years and killed before
its potential was fully developed or
exploited . A**** other things , it had
great capacity to be enlarged and if it
had remained in production, there
were plans for the 1957 or '58 model
year, to bore and stroke it to something
in excess of 440 cubic inches, which
would have made it the biggest and
easily, the most powerful engine in
any American production car of the
time. Another little-known innovation
too, that was also 'never to be' -
Packard had a completely, in-house
designed mechanical fuel injection
unit for this engine that would have
been used on the 'proposed but never
built '57 or '58 model year 440-plus
cubic inch engines as well. Instead,
the final '57 and 58' Packards ended
up being mere re-trimmed and
re-badged Studebakers using the
already obsolete 289 Studebaker V8,
boosted with a Paxton Supercharger.
But if things had been different, what
might have - and what "coulda',
shoulda', woulda'" been.

Mart3406
==========

 

I've actually had a vision of building a hot rod with one of those supercharged Packard engines.

Well maybe some day I will!

 

I know this is a very old thread but I think it should be pointed out that these pics are not the 1930s era V12 but they are the Twin Six that Packard built from 1915 to 1922. Three inch bore by five inch stroke (424 cid) and only three main bearings - makes about 90bhp @2600 but will rev to 3500. For most of those years it was their only model. It was quite advanced for its time. I have driven one - very smooth and powerful and every bit as fast as the straight 8s from the 1920s. After being used to fours and sixes I found it difficult to drive by the seat of the pants because of its smothness. They are all big cars, the one I drove had 135" wheelbase and all of them have no front brakes of course!

 

This early version also inspired Ferarri to develop the beloved 60deg V-12 decades later. He was always impressed by how easily the Packard racers of that time just walked away from everyone in the straights. I honestly can't recall who he was driving for at the time but it was a good read for a Packard guy. Of course Packard kept the same basic "architecture" when they released heir last version of the 12. Talk about smooth, you can balance a nickle on it's edge, on the engine, while it's running

 

Did they supercharge the Packard motors? I thought the 352 Packard motor was always naturally aspirated and they supercharded the Studebaker V-8s in the the very last Packard Hawks? I could be wrong, and I don't suppose there would be anything keeping you from slapping a supercharger on any motor you want?

BTW, the Franklin in my post above is also "supercharged", but it is mostly a marekting gimmic. There is a factory knob on the dash labled "Su' Ch". Imagine a cable operating a heater damper door, only the damper directs forced are from the squirrel cage blower into the carburetor. It is pretty low pressure charge, but forced air is forced air, I guess.

 

The engine pictured is a Studebaker. Had they supercharged the Packard it may have been something to see run.

 

Believe it or not, way back when, a few dragster guys ran blown packards on fuel. They did ok too. Way too heavy though