Packard enthus.

regarding your question about oil additive technology in the 1930's To my knowledge, what we now know as "anti friction" additives in motor oils did not exist until the "ecology/mileage" issue hit about 15-20 years ago. Let me qualify that below: This is admittedly an over-simplification; let me repeat as briefly as I can what has been well-discussed over and over again elsewhere in these forums. Hopefully this info. will be useful to our fellow car-buffs. There were three major improvements in consumer-grade motor oils following World War II, meaning "detergent" , multi grade" and "anti friction" oils. So called "multi-grade" and "detergent" oils came in around the same time, in the early 1950's. Both terms are just plain advertising nonsence. Here's why. SINGLE grade oils are actually "multi-grade", since they only have to pass a flow test at a "standard" temp - believe it is 210 0r 212 degrees F. At any OTHER temp, they need not meet any standard, because there isnt any. When cold, single grade oils get so thick, they cant get thru all the places they are supposed to go, which explains why cold dry starts cause so much wear. Multi grade oils are in fact a SINGLE GRADE, meaning they flow well when it is very cold, but retain their "film" strength when hot. The term "detergent" is also nonsence. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS 'DETERGENT' MOTOR OIL. Again, an advertising term to show the motor stays clean. Simply means the molocules cant "link up" to form sludge. "Detergent" oils CAN NOT DISSOLVE SLUDGE ! I got into a big argument about this around 1957, when I pulled my Packard Twelve apart for an overhaul. I cleaned out all the sludge, except for some "test sections" in the crank-case. One "test section" I left on the inside wall of the crankcase is where oil thrown off from the crankshaft hits it directly - the other is behind the webbing of the main bearing supports. I "pull" my oil pan down every few years as a good maintainence proceedure just to check things out; THOSE SLUDGE SPOTS ARE STILL THERE, DESPITE USING 10w30 EVER SINCE 1957 ! Well over 100,000 miles since then, under all kinds of driving conditions, including MANY years of Los Angeles traffic (yes...I am crazy enough to STILL be driving the same Packard Twelve.) Again, "detergent" oil simply means that the engine wont make MORE sludge. Will not effect EXSISTING sludge. CANT ! Chemically wont happen! No solvents in "detergent" oils ! Oils for use in gears, such as the hypoid axle gears, DID have anti-friction additives as early as the late 1920's. Again, if any of these sulpher-based anti friction formulas were used in MOTOR oils, I am not aware of it.

West - tell me it isnt true...did you REALLY take the duck off the radiator ?

please dont blame me personally for all these nonsensical stories about many many people driving cars around for many many miles prior to the Second World War, on oil that HAD NO ANTI FRICTION ADDITIVES. I was just a child, too young to drive, too young to be an accurate observor. Of course these new oils will immediately cause your cam-shaft to uncam, your drive-shaft to un-drive, unless you RIGHT NOW run out and buy these expensive additives. Seriously, guys, I just spent a fortune going thru the engine in my aircraft - an ordinary garden-variety Lycoming "360" series (translation - ordinary over-head valve cam-shaft with "flat" tappets). The cam and lifters ground themselves to "nubs" !. (and the thing still ran fairly well..!) As many of you know - we have no choice; we MUST use "legal" aircraft engine oil THAT MUST CERTIFY IT HAS THE ANTI FRICTION ADDITIVES ! So, clearly - the anti-friction additives that aircraft oils still have, did not prevent cam "spalling". My best guess on my own cam failure is the typical failure caused by "grinding" the camshaft and "surface grinding" the lifters during a previous overhaul. Again, there is overwhelming evidence the vast majority of the cam and lifter failures on "flat tappet" engines is caused by bad shop practice during overhaul, i.e. "re-surfacing" that removes the "hardness layer" on the cam and tappet bodies. Add to that engines that may sit idle long enough for microscopic "pockets" of corrosion on surfaces subject to extremes of pressure, and you get cam/lifter failure. So - again, the 'anti-friction" additives of course MAY help the cam-shaft issue, but not much. And again, the anti-friction additives were not put in for guys with older design "flat-tappet" engines - they were there to increase mileage. Now - I admit I am a snob - I like, for my collector car, the biggest, most expensive, most powerful cars. Someone refresh my memory - was there ANY really expensive, really powerful luxury car made after the early 1920's that did NOT have roller tappets..? Now, on this oil-additive issue - if you like "conspiracy" theories, it is a free country and that is your "right". Personally, my favorite "conspiracy theory" is the one where President Roosevelt is accused of hiring the Japanese to bomb Pearl Harbor. See...he wasnt really a wheel-chair bound paraplegic...he snuck out of the White House one night..broke into a Radio Shack, where he bought a radio he used to call up the Japanese Navy...and..and..

thanks for the info about stuff on the Internet. Now we know that all those people who CLAIM to have driven all those cars all those years prior to the 2nd World War are wrong, and we have to go run out and buy all these additives....

thanks for posting the photos - great ! But...be suspicious. LOOK CLOSELY at that '34 Packard V-12. It has 1933 front door WINDOW VENTILATORS. That's a clue we are looking at "pre production car - a "factory promo" photo - not a car that was actually ordered and delivered ! Of COURSE the factory photos often show white-walls. They wanted the cars to look glamorous. But again, MOST cars were delivered in those MUCH MORE CONSERVATIVE TIMES with black walls and dark somber paint jobs.

RE : the question was - will the "new" oils cause harm to "slider" (meaning non roller equippeed) tappet/camshaft systems. C'mon..guys..you are missing the point. The anti friction additives that are no longer being put into consumer-grade motor oils, WERE NOT PUT IN THERE BECAUSE OF CAMSHAFT ISSUES ! The petrol industry and the auto industry dreamed them up to hopefully get a bit more mileage out of cars. We had a long history of non-additive oils. Cars ran fine with them and gave good service life (remember, good service life in the old days was about 30,000 miles between valve jobs...MAYBE 60,000 miles between overhauls). But that was in large measure because most cars did NOT have air or oil filters. The insistance on the addition of anti friction additives to oils, by the makers of small piston-powered aircraft motors, has NOT stopped the epidemic of cam and lifter failure ! The failures are most likely due to 1) corrosion pits from long period of dis-use and 2) bad shop overhaul techniques. Let me explain. "Grinding" cams and surface grinding lifters is BAD PRACTICE. You generally damage or lose completley the thin "hardness" layer. You are lucky to get a couple of hundred hours of operation out of an engine that has re ground cams and lifters no matter WHAT additives you put in your oil. Of course there are exceptions. But again, the answer to the original question is - GO DRIVE THE THING ! FREQUENTLY ! Change the oil at regular intervals ! There were an awful lot of cars that did not have roller lifters, prior to the 2nd World War. And they racked up a lot of miles on engine oil that was far INFERIOR to ANY "legit" multi-grade oil you can buy today.

Dave - how's your sense of humor...may I tease you about that flat statement of yours ? You have EIGHT '38 - '39 Packard Twelves that do NOT have pressurized cooling systems ? That is interesting. Seriously, in fairness to Dave, for some reason Packard's technical writers were bashful about the new pressurized radiator filler cap and neck system for 1938; for some reason they did not SPECIFICALLY use the term "pressurized cooling system" in their literature when referring to this change. Hopefully, Dave wont mind being teased - should I suggest that I guess the radiator upper "filler-neck" in my own '38 Packard Twelve was custom-built just for me to beat up on Dave with, (as was the many dozens I have worked on down thru the years? ). My own raditor, and all the '38 Twelves and Super Eights I've seen, differ from 1937 and earleir "Senior" Packard production, in that they have the bottom "seal plate" for the spring-loaded pressure cap to "bottom" on, clearly was designed for a pressure radiator cap. What appeared to be original pressure cap on it when I got it in late '54 started to leak pressure as its sealing rubber went bad - replaced it several times over the years. Can I tease Dave about that special "custom-built just for my own Packard Twelve and the many dozens I have worked on", publication by Packard, its "tech. specs" known as the "1938 DATA BOOK FOR THE PACKARD TWELVE AND SUPER EIGHT" which refers (see Pp. 33 of the tech. specs. on the cooling system) "the air to boil temperature has been raised almost 10 degrees higher which gives cooling capacity for a much wider range of driving conditions"... C'mon...Dave..how do you think you raise the boiling temp. of water..!

c'mon - lets be honest. People today LIKE the words "antique" and "classic". People like these words because our culture has changed - as we've moved away from a manufacturing culture, where "precision of speech" had value, and gone downward towards being a third world country where educational standards dont matter, because the manufacturing jobs arent around any more, why BOTHER with accuracy. Of COURSE the words "classic" and "antique" are now tossed about with NO interest or concern for their meaning, other than the people who use them, have something to sell. Some months ago, I noted when I got off the freeway to get a bite, I had some "classic coke" with my "classic chicken". A "Caprice Classic" was parked outside, near the "Classic Upholstery" shop (which was next door to "Classic Plumbing". Hey, if a guy has a used Chevrolet and wants to call it a "classic"...this IS a free country - after all, I just the other month I rented a NEW Chevrolet (believe it was a re-badged Toyota) that had the word "CLASSIC" on the trunk deck-lid. Getting back to the question in the original "post" - the guy is RIGHT. New white walls were NOT available to a new car purchaser right after World War Two. But I have yet to see a post-war car that is now accepted by the Classic Car Club Of America without them. Hell..I LIKE white-walls. Sure, my own NON CLASSIC (please dont call my '38 Packard V-12 a "classic" any more - please call it what it is..an old used car..!) (let the guys with the used Plymouths and Fords have the word "classic" now...) did NOT come with white-walls. Yes..a few of them did. But as we've noted in other discussions, the pre war era was a VERY conservative one. And as the 1930's drew to a close, car colors became even more somber. SOME did order their cars "flashy" with white walls and colors other than black, dark green, or dark blue. Most did not.

Dave is only partially correct - in fact, for the 1938-39 production, all Twelves had full pressure cooling. '38 - '39 Twelve radiators carry the same part number. Now, in fairness to Dave, the 1937 and all earlier Packard Twelves did NOT have pressurized cooling systems. Why is this interesting ? The introduction of presssurized cooling systems permitted higher running temps. The faster you can get a motor up to operating temp, and the higher you can set that temp, the more effecient. The introduction of pressure radiators was but one of a whole bunch of incredible technological advances interrupted by World War Two, that gave us our modern short stroke "high rpm - severe duty capable" motors we have today.

the simple answer to your question is "no" - "new" oils will not cause any problems for cars with "slider" / flat tappets. Remember, earlier oils served us well without the "high pressure" anti-friction additives that have been a part of consumer-grade motor oils for the past few years. Remember, the so called "anti-friction" oils were added to improve gas mileage - not to solve any problems unique to so called "sliding" or "flat tappet" cam followers. True, high quality engines have had roller cam followers since at least as far back as World War One. True, "lesser" quality (meaning low and medium price car engines, where no-one ever thought they'd be run much past 100,000 mi, were not equipped with rollers. These days, even the lower-price motors now seem to have roller tappets. I am curious - even my Toyota now has roller tappers - does anyone know of any major manufacturer today who hasnt yet adopted roller tappets. Again, we consumer-grade motor operators ran up an awful lot of mileage on the ore-anti friction" additive oils. Now, let me qualify the above - SOME engines, such as the 300 and 500 series Lycoming aircraft engines, have a special problem where the so called "anti friction" additives seem to help a little. The reason for this is the location of the cam-shaft - very high in the engine, where they dont get the kind of oil bath that a cam-shaft in the standard location gets. If you happen to have a motor with the cam-shaft way high in the engine, you might be wise to use an "anti friction" additive.

to keep that "four hundred fifty dollar Duesenberg" price in perspective, remember, to get the equiv. REAL value in today's purchasing power, you'd have to multiply that amount by roughly fifteen. So that would be roughly seven grand! Weren't too many of us old car buffs who had nearly SEVEN THOUSAND DOLLARS to spend on a used car, and if we did...our families would probably have had us locked up !

see my response to your other "post" about while-walls.... Asparagus.

You raise a good point. Let me explain why your point is so valid. When we formulated our judging rules, the idea of a post war car participating in the Classic Car Club of America, if proposed at all, would have been considered at best laughable. Our NATIONAL HANDBOOK was more specific - down thru the years, the idea of "dilluting" our Club with such cars was described as "tantamount to destroying the purpose of our Club". Over the years, whenever the idea of adding post-war cars to our Club was proposed, surveys by the National Board confirmed the overwhelming majority of our members rejected the idea. Therefore, the idea of taking off points for "authenticity" never developed for cars that were beyond our concern. In later years, people who wanted to buy, sell, and operate post war cars under the auspices of the Classic Car Club of America correctly recognized the best way to do that, was go on a membership drive. A Club that did very well down thru the years with 1,500 to 2,500 members suddenly expanded to four, five, and now around SIX THOUSAND members. For the past several years, the people who now control the Club have even gone so far as to print under our traditional "National Policy Statements" (some of which I wrote personally !) that these "may no longer represent current Club policy". I dont think you are being realistic about what the current car club scene is all about. In earlier times, the public was at best disinterested in Classic Car Club events. Our judging rules and events had no conception of the idea of pleasing a crowd. Our criteria, reduced to its simplest terms, was historical accuracy, i.e. is "how closely does the car represent its condition on delivery day as a new car". Of course even then we had to make compromises with what was available to re-condition our cars. We most certainly DID take points off for "over restoration". It would not have occured to us to have "People's Choice" type awards, because the only people at our events were people interested in historical accuracy. Of COURSE you are correct that most people during the REAL classic era shunned white walls and wild paint jobs. Anyone who has seen photographs of that era, or knows the actual production figures, knows most cars, especially the more expensive luxury cars of the upper classes, were ordered a solid dark color, typically black. Many of us have seen the old FORTUNE MAGAZINE ads of Packard and other manufacturers, and the wild color combinations. I have probably owned, or worked on, or driven, or monkeyed around with, or seen on the street when they were in service, as many REAL classic era automobiles as anyone who reads these forums. I NEVER saw one painted up like those FORTUNE ads, and I rarely saw white walls. And as you note, the immediate post war era saw NO NEW CARS WITH WHITEWALLS...NONE..ZIP ! But let's be fair. The Classic Car Club Of America has, along with other car groups, changed with the times. If you put on a car show for the public, you have a duty, and they have a right, to expect just that...a SHOW. Of COURSE a brightly colored car with the "shine" of the latest high tech "two" or "three part" paint, with white-walls is going to attract more interest and please more people, than a solid dark colored car restored and equipped the way they REALLY were when new. You can laugh or cry about this, but good manners and a respect for the fact that times have changed, suggests you accept it without making further fuss about it.

yes - your price "post" confirms wha I remember from those later years of the 50's - as I noted above, the value of big classics (again, referring to the super-luxury cars of the late 20's thru the late 1930's) really took off at the end of that era. We early members of the Classic Car Club Of America must "take the blame" for making the public aware that these big luxury cars were worth saving, and thus incresing their value. Even as late as the early 1960's, there was still a lot of ridicule for anyone saving a big old "super luxury" car - there are at least THREE "I Love Lucy" episodes where "Lucy" demonstrates how dingy and irresponsible she was, by getting involved in some way with a big classic car. Now that he is no longer with us, I feel free to tell a cute story about J.B. Nethercutt. In the early 1960's, a bank trust tried to get him declared mentally incompetent to manage the family business. The basis ? They were able to prove he had "wasted" FIVE THOUSAND DOLLARS restoring an "old car" (Duesenberg..naturally !). I remember my own surprise, in my last year of high school - I couldn't borrow a "decent" car (meaning someone's late model Chevrolet or Ford) and HAD to take a date out in my '38 Pacard V-12 Formal Sedan. I pulled into a restaurant driveway, started to let the girl out, when the manager/owner came out, and asked me to park the car in FRONT where people could see it ( we classic car buffs were just accustomed to being asked to park out back somewhere where the place wouldnt be disgraced...!). I was in disbelief...you mean...the guy thought a big classic was an ASSET ?

fascinating news - didn't know that - I knew Packard had mechanical refrigeration prior to the war, but never actually saw one.

beats me...West..I never heard of a 12 lb cap for pre-war cars.. ? ? ?

dont you dare !

now..LISTEN UP..you guys...dont any of you try and twist my comments about which Packards had pressure caps, and which didnt...into a food fight ! As I noted in my above "post", my memory is not all that clear on the "baby" Packards, not surprised to learn the "baby" Packards did NOT have some of the technical features we snobs had for our "big" Packards! (incidentally, the "baby" Packards actually had more advanced technical features in some respects, when they first came out, than the "Senior Division" cars ! So - please...PLEASE do NOT get the idea I was looking down on the pre war "baby" Packards because I didnt know that they didn't have the pressurized cooling systems of the "big" Packards! Packard died for other reasons in a far different world that followed World War II. Seriously..I was actually BORN in a 1936 "120" ! There is NO question in my mind, that Packard survived the 1930's because it decided to enter the middle-price range. I will match that '36 Packard "120" we had for many years, against ANY car of its year in its price range. I dont want to be responsible for turning the focus of the original question in this "thread" into other areas, so I will have to again emphasize that as to the technical features of the smaller-engined Packards, I simply dont know or remember enough about them to make further useful contributions on this particular subject.

great picture, West ( see his above "post"). Tell us more about the picture !

I HOPE your reasoning proves accurate - for purely selfish reasons - at my age, I have to start thinking that eventually I wont be able to care for my Packard V-12 sedan, and will have to sell it. I am frankly worried that you might be wrong, and the values WILL decline substantially; again, look at all those "repeat" ads in HEMMINGS, OLD CARS WEEKLY, and other publications - the big "tankers" like mine just dont seem to sell. WEST - just thought of something to show you how low the values were, of big-engined '20's and '30's closed cars were out here in the west in the early 1950's, and how much our definition of what is or should be a high value "classic" has changed.... Do you have access, or can you get your hands on a copy of the late Bob Gottlieb's CLASSIC CARS AND ANTIQUES ? (this was one of the first major books suggesting that the luxury cars of the 20's and 30's we now call "classics" were worth preserving). In that book, you will see a photograph of my '34 Super Eight sedan - with other pages full of open Packard V-12's. His sarcastic caption "the difference between this and a classic Packard are so great they need no further comment from me"...! Bob's above papeer-back book was written around '53.. started showing up on newsstands a few months later. Elsewhere in his book, he explains why you should over-spend fixing up a classic car. He notes the illogic in spending two much... " why spend seventy five dollars for a classic that needs work, when one in near new condition can be had for $ 175.." It now turns out that more than one Packard V-12 has been customized/hot rodded with complete modern drive lines (one has a V-10 Ford). A friend of mine has some pictures; if anyone's interested, I will see if Gariepy wants me to "post" them in here (assuming I can figure out how to do that). Again, I have to agree with Gariepy - despite our varying opinions on details and methodology, we are all car buffs - I think there is something interesting, something to learn from any good "car fixing up" job, no matter what you call it or what it started out as.

for both WEST & Mr PUSH: WEST - I agree with you to this extent - the idea of doing what we now call "restorations" didn't really exist until the late 1950's - my recollection is that I never heard of a real modern-style full frame-off restoration until Jack Nethercutt came into the So. Calif. Region of the CCCA in the late 1950's. Now, let me qualify that - HCCA was already going pretty strong by the late 40's and early '50's - I do recall seeing full "frame off" restorations on big brass as early as around '53. I should have made it clear that the Duesenber "J" phaeton that Nate Duress (think that was his name) was trying to unload in '55, had NOT been restored. I used the term "95 points" to indicate the car was fairly sharp. A friend of mine and I paid seventy five bucks for a just about MINT MINT '38 Cad. V-16 Formal Sedan ( the Mae West car that just appeared on the auction circuit - West is right to this extent - as the CCCA become more popular and more effective in suggestion there really IS a "real value" to the biggest, most elegant cars of that era we called "classics", prices started to climb very rapidly. Three years later (1959) we sold the Cad. for $500 ! Another year or so it went to $5,000, and just after the 1950's had become the 1960's, it was already up to $15,000. West obviously knows more about the doings in the mid-west and east than I do - perhaps people were paying MUCH MUCH more for big engined classics then, than they were doing out here in the west. Let me explain a little more why I have a '38 Packard V-12Formal Sedan (yeah..I know...twenty five bucks was too much money, since it needed a battery) than a beautiful '35 V-12 Town Car that was on a used car lot on Santa Monica Blvd. for $75. I DIDNT HAVE SENVENTY FIVE BUCKS AND NO WAY TO GET IT ! Getting back to the subject of those Darrins - remember, to be fair and honest, ole Dutch was pretty much making "customs" ! To save money, he was ordering "120" coupes (he wouldnt pay the extra price Packard wanted for the heavier-framed convertible) and used those to create his beautiful cars. The damn things were so flimisy the doors would spring open if the car flexed - when Packard finally got a hold of the "Darrin" project those cars had MUCH better chassis and body flex control.

"cheap" Duesenberg ? Naw - never happen. Actually, never did happen. In fact...the legend of "cheap" Duesenbergs is just that..nonsence - just a legend. I know, "I was there". In '55, a pretty nice (what today, would be about a 95 point car) Duesenberg phaeton was on the market for months in So. Calif, with no takers. Why - price was too high. I mean...FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS. You guys have ANY idea how much FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS was to the average car buff, who considered himself in paradise if he even SAW a fifty dollar bill..?

you are W R ONG - W R O N G - W R O N G ! I DO admit it ! Well said - great posts !

I disagree. Again - look at the auction results and the ads in HEMMINGS & OLD CARS WEEKLY. Yes, the open cars seem to move - but month after month you see the same closed cars, even really sharp condition "real" classics such as cars similar to my Packard V-12, and a couple of Cadillac V-16's, re-advertised over and over again. We all saw the late '30's hot rod / custom Lincoln Zephyr go for MUCH MUCH more than a sharp bone-stock original. Again, I have no answers, and I am not even sure any more what the questions are !

JT - I remain confused by your posts. Packard went from non-pressurized to conventional pressure caps in 1938. A 1939 and 1940 radiator would be similar, if not identical for any given series Packard engine . Both '39 & '40 were pressurized, and both had their filler necks UNDER the hood - not like the 1937 & earlier, the last year where the radiator cap was also the hood ornament.