A Packard was a combination of ultra-advanced gadgets and antique body architecture. The body on a '56 Packard was built like the body on a '36 Buick. The '56 Packards had a huge engine, pushbutton control of the Ultramatic transmission and four-wheel torsion bar suspension. That system, once sorted was ultra-cool. Nothing else like it. GM tried air bags in 1958 that bombed. The Packard system, although fairly electrically complex, worked really well. You could load three huge people in the back seat, then watch the body raise in the rear, When those people got out, the body would go back down, back to level. There was a series of relays that ran the system, powering a Delco starter motor to run the torsion bars. Excellent build quality. Sometimes a mish-mash of components. Common to find an Autolite starter, Delco generator, Prestolite ignition. They used what ever parts they could get on credit. They used Rochester and Carter carburetors. All-Delco electronics and a Carter AFB on the 374 made a competent power plant. Fuel economy was not a consideration to Packard owners. If you could afford a Packard, you could afford the gas.....
Packard in 1956 had the coolest instrument panel extant. I think they used it and the Clipper tail lights in the "57 Studepackards.....
They used a '54 Cadillac Wonderbar radio in the '56 big Packards. I still have a Packard Wonderbar here in my junk box. The straight 8 Packards were the better ones, in my opinion.
My dad thought anything that was not a 6-cylinder Chevrolet was a gas guzzler. I'll bet a Buick or Packard didn't get more than a couple miles per gallon worse mileage than a Chevy 6....
The best car on gas I ever saw was a Falcon with the 144 six. Slow as pond water.......
I haven't failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.....Thomas Alva Edison
