R11 overdrive

does anyone have experience with the wiring on the governor. only one yellow wire came with the harness and this is all that is listed on two different wiring diagrams i have. the governor actually has 2 wires on it. i confirmed this is correct from a plate in the parts book. it seems odd there would be an unused wire.

anyone run into this?

The governor should be internally grounded and just require the yellow wire run to it.

Another thought I had was did your car have the electromatic clutch? Can you make out any markings on the terminals of the governor or can you identify the wire colors?

The R-11 governor with the Electromatic does have two wires. One is for the overdrive and the other is for the Electromatic. There are two sets of points in the governor. When the car is below, I believe 22 miles per hour, the Electromatic is operable (the lower set of points are closed) and above that speed the overdrive is operable when upper the points close by the rod attached to the governor weights. The idea is to prevent free wheeling when downshifting from 3rd to 2nd at higher speedss. I would imagine that the two wire governor could be used on a non Electromatic car by simply using the wire for the upper point set..

The terminal you want to use for the yellow wire should be marked "AD" and as Dave suggested you can disregard the "EC" terminal.

Frank, I emailed you a picture and text from the shop manual. Hope it helps.

YFAM, Randy Berger

thanks for the info. i missed the section on the electromatic clutch in the manual which i do not have. that is what my mystery wire is there for.

thanks all for the replies.

Hello all. I am new here and realize that this is an old post. I have just purchased a 1949 Packard Deluxe and I am trying to get the overdrive to work properly. It worked for me the other night after going through the wiring and resolving what I thought were issues. RPM seemed high for engagement though. Around 45 MPH. On the return drive it would not engage. I do realize that I now need to check the contacts in the OD solenoid and governor for cleanliness and continuity. In this posting it is stated about a second wire on the governor for the electomatic clutch. My car does not have a red clutch pedal indicating this car does not has that option and the clutch button on the dash is there but seems to be internally disabled. Whom ever worked on this car previously may not have had good knowledge of the R11 overdrive. From this post, I understand that a second wire on the governor indicates electromatic clutch. I have one that comes out of the wire harness to the governor. The other terminal is connected to the frame. If this car does not have the clutch option where would the second wire go? Should it even be there. The wire looks original but not the ground connection. Since the electromatic clutch is not present, could the grounding of this second terminal cause the OD not to engage properly? Now having said that, maybe this car use to have the clutch option(still no red pedal) and it has been removed. How would I tell? So many questions....I hate being a newbe, but we all have to be there sometime. LOL. Thanks in advance for all assistance offered.

The governor contacts get ground thru a small tab of metal riveted to the bakelite back cover and positioned under one of the screws holding the cover on. Those tabs can corrode or screw can loosen so that bears checking. Normally if the car is not equipped with the clutch the extra wire is just coiled and tucked up out of harms way. Grounding it won't hurt but is not the cause of your issue. Chances are your car didn't have the clutch option new -- or if it did and there are no signs of any of the mechanism on the side of the engine or firewall then it was properly and completely removed.

If you go to www.packardinfo.com and check the literature section under training manuals, there are manuals for the overdrive and the Electromatic clutch. R11 OD is listed under Borg-Warner (although there are better copies on other car sites) and the postwar clutch is in the manual for "Clutch and Electro-matic Clutch"

Thanks for that info. I was working on it ths morning, pulled the cover off the coil and cleaned the contacts. I connected the wires back on the the coil, by-passed the governor with a switch and was able to activate the OD coil. So I'm going back out and put it all back together and try it again with the by-pass switch. If I can hear it engaging, then I'll know that if it doesn't engage on the highway, I'll have to pull the governor out. Which looks like you have to lower the back end to get it out. Have any pictures of what one looks like when it's out so I know what to expect. Thanks for your help.

There was a wrench available to remove the governor without lowering anything but depending on the car, it is tight. There are a couple of removal ideas and fabrication details from one poster who made a tool. Ideas and his tool version details and issues are in a thread on 41 overdrive governor: http://forums.aaca.org/f134/41-overdrive-governor-wiring-tool-kmo-260805.html#post651541 His width and thickness dimensions are important.

Am posting a picture of the Packard tool which was used on R9 and R11 units. A new and different one was issued for the 51 cars so this one should be proper for your car. Also pictured is the governor as it comes out of the OD. The gear should come with it and is held by a clip or snap ring.

Awesome!! Thank you. I cleaned the contacts and put a small dob of dialectric grease on them, put it all back together and could still hear the coil engaging. Couldn't go for a drive as my Dad stopped by for some garder tractor repairs. Very nice of imported_fordmerc to post the wrench info. Kudos to him. Going for a spin today. Hopefully the govenor will do the job. Thanks again.

EDIT: The OD worked flawlessly. Very happy to have it working. I think the issue was the contacts in the coil. Thanks for the help.