Packard history

[TC Chris]

Seems to me we have some Packard fans here. The Mich. Hist. Society is doing a video lecture on the Packard proving grounds. They were designed by Albert Kahn, Michigan's most significant architect. For one thing, he designed the Willow Run factory where Henry Ford built WW II bombers almost as fast as he built cars, and where GM later built Hydra-Matics.

About Willow Run:

"Despite these issues, Willow Run was able to achieve remarkable production rates. At its peak in 1944, it produced a B-24 every hour. By 1945, it was able to produce 70 percent of its B-24s in two nine-hour shifts, with pilots and crew members sleeping on 1,300 cots as they waited for the B-24s to roll off the assembly line. The Ford Motor Company eventually produced half of their 18,000 total B-24s at Willow Run."

A B-24 every hour. Contemplate that.

Most industrial communities have a Kahn building; my hometown had several. He basically invented the 20th century industrial-manufacturing plant.

The Packard presentation is virtual; here's a link to sign up. Non-members have to pay $7.00.

https://www.hsmichigan.org/packard-prov ... luxury-car?

By the way, right now they are tearing down what remains of the Packard plant in Detroit. It sat as an abandoned ruin for years. It was a Kahn project too. Read about it here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packard_Automotive_Plant

Chris Campbell

[electra225]

I was in Detroit in the late 1960's. The Packard plant was still in fairly good shape then. Quite an impressive complex.

There wasn't another car built like a Packard. A mixture of high-quality workmanship and antique technology. Along with Pontiac they were the last cars built in the USofA with a straight eight engine and six volt electricals. Their body technology and front suspension was like GM put on cars in the 1930's. Every Packard was a classic car when it left the assembly line. It was an antique when it went on the drawing board. Packard straight eight engines were some of the finest power plants ever built.

[walyfd]

Packard was the American Rolls Royce. Solid build quality, the best suspension system with torsion-aire, interiors were beautifully done... shame they went under.

I'd love a '55 or '56 400 or Patrician or a '37 V12.

We stopped by the plant in '02 during CLC Nationals and I took a piece of shattered glass from one of the office windows.

[Firedome]

I've had both a loaded '56 Pat and a '56 Clipper stripper (man trans and std suspension). Those doors were like bank vault doors. I wanted to put a '47 flathead 6 in the Clipper, the Packard flatheads were their best, and the 356 and 327 8s wouldn't fit in the "modern" body I preferred. A guy I know in MD makes "Packups" (p/u's out of the Rinehart "high pockets" body '51 to '54s), amazing vehicles that he will drive anywhere, and has.

[electra225]

Agreed that the flathead was better than the V8. I had the brilliant idea one time to try and pull a 356 and Ultramatic, en masse from a 1950 Custom 8. The 356 weighed 1000 pounds by itself...

[Firedome]

Packard was known in the '30s as "the Master Motor Builder". Their version of the Merlin was even better built and more powerful than RR's, and the triple V-12s used in the 72' Elco-built PT's were also incredible engines that contributed to our victory in WWII. My wife's father was on one of them, but never bumped into JFK lol.

Though a flathead, imo the '30's version of the Twin Six was the best US V12 ever built (smoother and more durable than Cad's ohv, and OK, maybe a tie with Pierce's, we won't get into V-16s here). The 9 bearing monster 1000 lb 356 flathead straight 8 that replaced the both previous 1930s 384 straight 8 and the V12 in 1940 and lasted until 1950 was the best straight 8 ever imo, a totally different engine than the smaller/lighter 359 9 bearing engine found in the '51-54 Rinehart cars. The 356 crank alone weighed nearly 200 lbs! so smooth it's almost hard to hear one running. The '46 and '47 CSC is the newest car accepted as a "full classic" by the CCCofA, and on my bucket list, but not likely to happen now.

Even Packard's flathead 6s, found mostly in taxis and the cheapest models, were among the best of their type. I almost bought one to put in a '56 Clipper that had oiling issues typical of the earlier '55/6 brilliant but under-developed V8s, a situation caused by a cash starved company desperately trying to compete.

[electra225]

The V-8's are not too bad once they are rebuilt. The oiling situation can be largely improved by removing the vacuum pump from the oil pump so oil pressure doesn't leak thru the vacuum pump. New production hydraulic lifters are better than the originals. Modern oils, particularly full-synthetics go a long way to alleviate the lubrication challenges in a Packard V-8. The 374 lived for three decades longer under the hood of a Rolls-Royce, bored and stroked to over 400 cubic inches.

The 356 could be tuned so it would idle dead silently, with a quarter standing on its edge on the cylinder head, at 250 rpm. The later nine-bearing 359 was lighter and faster and had a four-barrel carburetor, along with Twin-Ultramatic drive. Even the nine-bearing 327 that replaced the 356 in 1951 was dead silent in operation and performed almost as well as the 356. I agree that it is hard to find a better developed engine than the Packard 356.