ENLIGHTNING EXPERIENCE?

[RO]

Only rationale explanation I can come up with:

A few weeks ago we took three cars to the local botanical gardens to support a 50th reunuion for a local high school. My wife drove the '56 Clipper Custom and she said it drove well. While we were under the pavilion, a tremendous thunderstorm erupted with lightning strikes right on top of us. The lightning persisted for almost 1/2 hour and the strikes were very close. The hood was down the entire time.

When my wife drove the car home, she said it shook violently and she didn't think she would make it home. She said it ran terrible. I was not behind her as she was headed home and I was headed elsewhere at the time. I didn't think to0o much about it until the next day.

Next day I pull the car out of the garage and head up the hill and sure enough, car is running poorly. I thought it was just the carburetor perhaps and it would smooth out so we headed down the road for a 55 mile trip to a car event. But I had to stop a mile down the road and I found 2 plug wires loose and one completely off at the distributor cap. Thought it peculiar, but reseated the wires and went on the trip. But one or two of the wires loosened at the trips end and again one mnore time and when we got hom, one wire was barely in the distributor cap. The only explanation I can come up with is the lightning hit very very close to the car and shook the plug wires off. We also are missing the piece of upper stainless across the windshield and had to get a spare off theb parts car. Anyone ever have a close lightning strike to effect the plug wires?

[Guest imported_PackardV8]

Did the Pavillion have a metal roof????? When did u loose the moulding relative to the lightening strikes????? U probably need to squeeze the plug wire terminals together and spread the distributor terminals to get a good tight snap fit. They probably did not fit tight to begin with????

I keep several small engine power equipment (like lawn mower) units in various sheds with alot of metal and have experienced the mag coil going bad on them from time to time. I've often wondered if it had something to do with lightening striking near the storeage shed with a lott of metal construction or roof.

[RO]

Don't think the roof is metal, but metal construction around. The lightning hits were too close for comfort. Thing is the plug wires have been seated in there for 1500 miles and the car drove great to the event and then the shaking of the car was immediately upon starting up and comings back. We do not have a handle on when that piece of molding was lost, but it as well had been on the car since it was restored...it's the long piece across the top of the windshield essentially held on by the two clips on each side that are dilled through the rubber. The design should have included a middle clip. Just some sort of shock or vibration or close by strike effect is all I can come up with. Headed out in just a few moments with the car for the first time since that trip on the next day from the lightning. Pretty bizarre.

[55PackardGuy]

Be Careful. That car might now be capable of time travel.

(See "Back to the Future," "Repo Man," and "Buckaroo Banzai" for details and how-to-proceed.)

[Joe Block]

Back to the future, imagine going back to 54 and getting to ride in a new one. Comparing that what you expect today, I bet they were rougher than we remember, as the baseline has shift with all this "modern metal" or shoud we say "modern plastic"

[55PackardGuy]

Speaking of strange Packard experiences, back in the '60s my mother was driving my brother and me on a dark country road, and the headlights completely failed on our '55 Clipper (owned by my father since new). The lights just went out. I don't remember if the dash lights were affected, but the direction signals did work, so we "blinked" our way down the road a couple of miles... and the lights suddenly came back on! My dad, a mechanic, went over everything with a fine-tooth comb. Never found a reason for the failure, and it NEVER happened again in the many years we drove the car after that.

OK, really strange part--on that same stretch of road, nearly in the same place, on another dark night, the lights failed on our '42 Chevy 4x4 truck (basically an "army truck"). That thing had mil spec electricals throughout--blackout dash lights and everything. My dad was driving alone at the time, and of course, the lights again came back on, just like in the Packard incident, and no problem was found, and the "lights-out" never happened again with that vehicle. However, we rarely drove that old truck at night.

But strange, isn't it?

<span style="font-weight: bold">This would make a great "strangest-most-surreal and/or ENLIGHTENING EXPERIENCE" you've ever had in a Packard thread.</span>

They always were mysterious cars--the "Packard Mystique" is more than just a catch-phrase, I think. Darn things are spooky. Remember Charles Starkweather and the Black Patrician? (story of his murder spree immortalized in books, movies--including 'Badlands' and 'Natural Born Killers'--and a TV documentary, 'Murder in the Heartland').

Also, that darn Packard, mentioned by name, in Chinatown--in which Faye Dunaway... well, I won't spoil it.

"Christine" is a piker compared with the Packards of lore... <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" />