Thread: My car and what I hope to do with it

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Hi Folks. I own a 1940 Packard 120 4dr streetrod. I bought it several years ago with new paint, upholstery, 350/350 under the hood, new exhaust system, ac, new wiring, Denman wide whites on the ground. Sounds great, doesn't it? Unfortunately, not one piece of work on the car was done right. The former owner spent a wad of cash getting a very rough car patched up and covered with a slick paint job.
I was aware of the rough underpinnings, and I paid accordingly. Sad to say, there was even more problems than I was aware of. The car barely ran, the brakes were borderline, the front end was worn out, and worse.
About this time, a body man who worked at the same auto dealer where I work learned of the car and volunteered to restore it. I had seen his work, and I felt he would do a good job. Five years later, much had been done, but the car was less than half finished. I decided that enough was enough, and got the car back from him. Today, it has a Firebird subframe under the front, 350 Iroc engine out of a Camero with 700R4 on the back, and still has the original Packard rearend. The car is in prime, the interior gutted, all chrome trim but the grille removed, and the front sheet metal hung on loosely. The body is basically complete, but there will be much smoothing to finish it. All the glass but the doors is out. Rewiring will be needed, because of the fuel injected engine. The wiring that came with the car (what there was of it) was done all in 14ga. Blue. I hope to be able to reclaim most of the trim from the body man who had the car for so long.
My first plan is to try to get the car in running condition. I can't decide whether or not to keep the Packard third member. It originally had 16" wheels, and I have not been able to find a match for the bolt pattern so that I could update to modern tubless type wheels. At present, the front end has 15" wheels and tires off a 1986 Pontiac Parisienne. I plan to go with plain steel wheels with baby moons and trim rings. I measured the width at the outside of the brake drums where the wheels mount on the rear end, and I came up with 61 15/16". The condition of the gears in the unit is basically unknown, and I have not been able to get my hands on a puller which would allow me to remove the axle mounted drums.
As you can see, I have a dandy project on my hands, and at age 66, I hope I have enough time left to finish it. My income will not allow me to jump in with both feet, so I must chip away at it bit by bit. I do have a nice concrete floored garage and a good air compressor and plenty of tools left over from the years I worked as a mechanic. Any suggestions or advice would be greatly appreciated. Scruffybeast, Winter Haven, Florida

Hey Scruffy, welcome to CHR. I thought maybe I was the oldest living hot rodder at 63, so it's good to see another senior twistin' wrenches.

WOW, that's quite a lot to have on your plate isn't it. But not to worry, there are plenty of fine, knowledgeable folks on this board who are willing to pitch in and help. I'll start off by offering up a list of widths from several different cars.
http://www.teufert.net/other/rear%20...dimensions.htm

Welcome Scruffy. Sounds like a very nice car you are working on. I believe I would opt for a different rear end, I see Tech allready gave you the good list. I would also suggest a new wiring kit, I think "Painless" makes one with the harness for the injection.

Welcome to CHR, working on these things is what keeps us young [ Ill be 70 in one month],get to the point where you can drive and enjoy it as you go along working on it. sounds like my kind of car, I am in to the rare type rods. I drive mine all summer an when the weather gets cold here in Pa. it gets work done on it. Enjoy it Scruffy thats what its all about an good luck. Dick

Hi Guys. Thanks so much for the fantastic spec sheets. Surely, something on this list will do the job. I do have one stupid question, however. Does flange to flange refer to the outer axle flange? Just wondering. Thanks again! Buffybeast.

Just a quick note to say that I slipped up and used my old online name, Buffybeast. That was my username for a good while until some rascals on Ebay tried to steal my identy. I had to get a new credit card and name. The joys of the Internet.
I do have one problem that probably has no solution. When the fellow that worked on the car before installed the Firebird subframe, it ended up with the front wheels to the rear of center in the wheel opening. Altlhough I am not sure he knew it, he got it in the only place it would go and still allow the front sheet metal to fit over everything. As it is, the steering box butts right up behind one of the small grilles on each side of the main grille, so if the subframe had been any further forward, the front sheet metal would not have covered everything. It would seem that a Nova subframe with the differently located steering would have been better, but it is too late to do anything about it now. The car does sit a little high, with the wheels sitting low in the wheel arch. Lowering the front somewhat would make the rearset wheels less conspicuous. I will try to get some photos posted soon to show how things look. Thanks Scruffybeast

How do you go about posting pictures to the forum? Scruffybeast

"Does flange to flange refer to the outer axle flange?"

yep

Welcome ! You can post pictures easily, but first you must shrink the picture you want to post. You can use several programs on your computer to do that. After you have resized the picture, click the browse box in the attach file box and locate your picture and Bingo it's attached to your post. My model A has been in work now for 12 years, and have been driving it for 4 years. I don't have the time or money to finish it, so I press on every winter with little projects. Try to get it to a safe drivable condition, and drive all summer and work all winter. Good luck...