History
My dad Noodles found this beautiful Packard in the shed of the local Fruitologist Down the road in Morotai Rd Revesby in 2012 after it had sat under a sheet for 20 years since being imported from the USA. He thought it would make a great father and son project for me for my first car.
He came home one Saturday morning and said Harry I've bought you a car. I was esstatic and said where is it thinking it was just out the front. He said its just down the road in Fred's garage and we have to go and get it. He forgot to mention that it wasn't going as it had suffered a case of a small fire in the engine bay and had to be rebuilt. Oh well we'll give it a try and towed it and the 1000 associated parts back up the hill. .Over the next 12 months we rebuilt and installed the motor,the carby, the braking system, steering rods,radiator, installed new tyres ,scrubbed and sanded the interior and body. to have it running and ready to go to the NSW Department of transport for an inspection for registration. I was very excited as I had grown to love this somewhat of a Ratrod with a 374 cu in motor that was the envy of my mates some of whom were petrolheads but I still didn;t have a licence. so one early Thursday afternoon after after my dad had obtained the appropriate permits and insurance we cruised over to the motor transport department at Beverley Hills expecting the Packard to pass the inspection with flying colours. To say that I was disappointed with the inspector registering 28 defeats is somewhat of an understatement. So no rego that day and a drive back to Revesby in the heavy peak hour traffic.
Along the way we could hear a thump thump thump noise, so Noodles pulled up and got out to check the drive shaft because that was where the noise seemed to be coming from. Nothing loose there he said so he got back into the car and despite the noise continued driving along Henry Lawson Drive towards home and the Salt Pan Creek bridge . Well about a futher 200 m as we were then heading downhill towards the Creek with 2 lanes merging into one the rear of the Packard dropped and the back wheel passed us at a rapid pace to bounce up onto the footpath and drop down the slope into the murky abyss of the Georges River. My dad trying to control the car to a safe stop his knuckles gone completely white from holding the steering wheel and with his face the colour to match glided the car over to the gutter.Traffic was dodging every which way.
When we exited the car and as he was staring down at the vacant space where the wheel normally resided said he couldn't understand how the wheel had come off as he had put them on himself. It was at this point that I had to confess that myself and a couple of friends had removed the wheels the previous weekend to put onto another vehicle so that it could be moved and probably hadn't put all the wheelnuts back on correctly.
Well the upshot was that he probably didn't talk to me for the next 3 months and the Registration of the Packard was put on the backburner for the same period . It was eventually registered and sold to a chap in Ballarat Victoria who was after a father and son project also. Please be careful what you ask for as you may not always get it . Harrison
