Prestige didn’t come any more impressive than the Packards of the 1930s and this V12 powered hauler of the upper crust was near the top of the food chain. You can bid on a blue tarp covered 1938 Model 1608 listed here on eBay in Fullerton, California with an unmet opening bid of $25,000. A big thank you to an anonymous Barn Finds reader for the tip!
Cadillac and Lincoln were closest competitors of Packard at the time since storied brands such as Pierce-Arrow, Duesenberg and Stutz failed to survive the punishing business environment of the Great Depression, and Packard offered the cachet of being something more than a Caddy or Lincoln. This ’38 Packard Twelve can trace its roots back to the Packard Twin Six of 1916.
The car at auction is described as rust free and that it spent its life in California. The seller says that it has its original paint and in some of the photos you can see some surviving pinstriping. The body appears to be straight and complete, but one of the sidemount spares is not in place. While the car is not a convertible, it does have an open roof since the fabric and timber covering has rotted away, hence the blue tarp.
Even in the interior’s poor state, you can see in the photos that it was made up of quality components. The door fittings are very detailed with their fluted surfaces and wood good enough for high-end furniture caps the tops of the doors. This car has fabric on the seating surfaces both front and rear and most chauffeur driven cars had leather on the front seats, so this one may have been driven by its owner.
This should be a 473 cubic inch flathead V12 that produced 175 horsepower and an incredible 322 lb-ft of torque at 1,400 rpm when it was new. Power was transferred to the rear axle through a three-speed floor shifted transmission with synchros on the top two gears. It had vacuum-assisted clutch and brakes and adjustable ride control from the driver’s seat. “Ask the man who owns one,” was Packard’s slogan for many years- are you ready to be “the man?”
At $25 k it’s clear that he wants his money out of the chroming ( which is fair ) and the car itself isn’t that valuable, maybe more like $10-12k in this condition. It is going to take a few gold bars to restore it, but as others have said on this site prewar values are waining, so unless it’s your labour of love and your looking to keep it when your done you might want to be carefull buying this car at that price. JMO.
Canadianmarkseh, while it may be worth less at present, fully restored it can fetch north of $150,000. I have seen a restored cabriolet sell for $430,000. I think you need to put more thought into your comments before putting them in print. Esspecially since it appears to be complete. Yes chrome can cost over $10K for show quality.
This car fully restored wont hit $100k. Ask the man who owns one!
Hi Balstic we are running out 70 year old millionaires that want one of these. And as cool as this is anyone that can afford to pay this guys price is going to just buy a nice one. Now I’m not saying that there aren’t any rich guys in there 30’s that wouldn’t want this I’m saying there are dam few 30’s rich guys that would want this. And again they’re going to want a restored one. And for that reason I believe there might have been a time when these were fetching $150k but as I said above those days are waining. I stick to my opinion and I did think it through.
My Grand father had a 1936 Packard 12 – 7 Passenger Sedan. After he passed on, my Grandmother drove it. I can remember when she sat on 2 or 3 phone books (thick ones) so she could see between the dash and the top of the steering wheel. My Dad had installed wooden blocks on the gas and brake pedal so she could drive it. She never used the clutch (I think she invented the automatic transmission, not sure about that though).
I was dismayed when she sold it when I was 12 for $50.
She felt sorry for some greedy family who immediately sold it and bought a house. Times have changed.
Even with a 12 banger I don’t think it is worth that much. Yeah sure if you restore it it will bring considerable money. However if it had a 6 in it, your looking at maybe 6K in this shape. I just don’t feel it is worth this much. I am no Packard pro though. I would live to own one one day though.
Pete, as with all collectable cars it is the unique components that give it value. The twelve cylinder engine, among other items such as the clock in the back, give it value. A 6 cylinder engine in a ’38 Packard Twelve would be a mid-market car, and yes it would only be worth $50-$60K restored. But that is not the point of restoration, it is saving one of 556 made and ultimately making as much as possible. It will cost you the same to restore a 6 cylinder as the 12 except for the engine itself. I grew up around restoring classic autos. It is certainly not excluding the common persons from performing a restoration as long as they keep in mind how long it can take and to what level is required. Doing half assed just means you shouldn’t be doing it to begin with.
Just to overhaul this engine is $50k! To overhaul a 6 cylinder is only a fraction of that.
Dairyman, and so is the value difference between a mid market Packard with the 6 versus the limo which only came with the 12. To put the 6 in that body diminishes its value.
1938? It comes Daddy Warbucks approved.
Don’t know the dollar value and don’t really care. I made my money by hard work in the trucking business I owned and sold a few years ago. Now I look at the wow factor, and this has plenty.
Has anyone looked at the car’s provenance? Sometimes attaching a respectable or desirable name to the car’s history can be a real game changer in the restoration approach.
I do not think you restore this car for money. There are plenty of other cars that have greater up sides and require less work. You restore this car because it is a fantastic example of American design and craftsmanship. You restore this car because you take enormous pride in bringing back to life something that represents America at its mechanical zenith. These are functional beautiful machines that gave reality to The American Dream.
You want to make money? Buy stock in Amazon…..
Rodney – GSM
Who gives a hoot what it’s worth or how much it’s going to cost? You restore it because it’s a Packard. Period.
Very well said, Rodney and Coventrycat. Nobody can argue with you at all. I feel guilty about even considering the potential value of the car
While this is a series 1608, it’s the 7-passenger sedan without division window, not the limousine. I’ve owned several Packard limousines over the years, 1937 to 1953. I feel this car is a bit over priced by about $10k, especially when the entire roof is gone.
I was in southern California in 1970, and while visiting another Packard collector in La Jolla, CA, I’m pretty sure this very car was sitting there in his lot, the roof covered with an old canvas tarp. I think I still have a photo of this car next to a 1930 Packard coupe. Since there were likely only about a half dozen 1608 7-passenger sedans made, the chances are pretty good I saw this car almost 50 years ago.
I checked the prices on a recent N.A.D.A. price guide:
Their low price [for a running & driving vehicle in need of restoration]: $34,000.
Mid-range price is $68,000. High price [for a very nice restored car]: $115,000.
Good on you Bill. Nice to read your recollections. I’ve always dreamed of owning a Packard of this vintage for the past 45+ years. This is a beautiful car. It is worth whatever someone will pay. It is also true — as has been widely discussed here on BF — that the market for these has been in decline for some time now. That isn’t a comment on what a nice car this is, just the reality of aging Baby Boomers. I share the view that Millennials are not going to pick up the antique car hobby to the same degree when Boomers go to sell their car collections. Especially cars from 1900s – pre-WWII. The inconvenient truth is there’s going to be a significant adjustment in price downward for pre-1950s cars in the next 10 years. Not important if you love the hobby as I do.
Personally, I feel it’s worth whatever someone will pay.
I’m a little surprised that the seller has so-few quality pics….and only one of the engine?
He’s not trying very hard!
$25k starting bid, 1 day, 6 hours left ……” 0 “…… Bids I rest my case there will likely be no takers.
Greetings All,
While it’s possible………
I don’t see $12.5K worth of chrome wrapped up here.
Car has far more chrome that hasn’t been done,
So a couple of bumpers consists of “having the chrome done”?
Disagree on value, I don’t think it worth what has been said, SCM agrees with me.
It won’t make $25K
I always wonder why a car like this is sitting outside????
8 hours 14 minutes still no bids, I’ve herd a lot of chatter about how this should be restored because of its historical value yet I still see not a single taker I think its only worth about $15k and that is that. As Howard pointed out on the parka red with the straight 8 it’s likly that this will get restomoded. As for the engine clean it up and get it running and put it on a display stand. Maybe a guy could lone it out to an auto museum. Part of this cars problem is who wants a big old box on wheels. As Jay Leno has pointed out many of these big tanks had the body removed and a custom roadster body put in its place. You can send the box body on to the museum too if you can find a taker. Let’s face it this has been sitting outside rotting away for years because it’s to dam big to sit inside. Make it into something desirable and maybe it gets a second life. The fact is people only identify with what’s in front of the windshield that long hood and fenders. The rest is rather uninteresting. Just how many museums queens do we need to carry forward this time in history. If someone doesn’t rethink this car it is going to sit and rot away JMO.
Say canadainmarkseh, you sure seem to knock alot of rare machines here. The reason there are no bids is because the starting bid is too high. Start the bidding at $100 and let the bidders tell the seller what they feel it’s worth. The bidding will climb well over 10k, maybe just not 25k. The seller can always put a high reserve if the top bid fails to meet what he needs for the car. As for saying this Packard is rotting away, I fail to see any rust out on the body. Also, this is a Senior Packard 12, you can not compare any part of this car to a Junior model Packard 110 6 or a model 120 8. The Super 8s and 12s will always be wanted cars.
Dairyman why would it cost 50,000 to overhaul this engine. That doesn’t make sense to me. You’ve got a basic flat head engine that most parts most likely would be reusable.
Why a V12 costs a bit more to rebuild… These were very good motors to begin with, and therefore got a lot of miles with minimal maintenance. The first owner typically sold it to someone who probably didn?t take it to the dealer for maintenance, and probably didn?t clean the air filter or change the oil as often as he should, which ate into the bearings, and didn?t help the cylinders or the valve silencers. There are also many, many needle bearings in the rollers on the cam followers and the shaft those pivot on, if those are worn, you need to replace them. There are very few parts that you can buy at your local parts store. I did try buying a gasket set once for $400 (less head and manifold gaskets) – and threw most of them away ? if you want them to work well and look nice, you will end up making them. The crankshafts are usually worn just a little too flat and you have to grind them – you have to drill out the heads of the counterweight bolts, and the stakes and take the weights off, remove the bolts, grind it, replace the weights using special bolts that you modify, grind them off and rebalance the shaft. You can?t buy rod bearings, or for that matter rod cap nuts. Having rod bearings done to the level that you want for a V12 that will be run hard is about $100 each. If you need the mains and cam bearings done, add another $800, plus the cost of align boring them. No one makes the original style steel strut aluminum pistons, so you need to use forged which are about $1200 or more a set. There is a lot of labor in cleaning up and restoring the valve train and if you need to buy a set of valve blocks, they are $1500 – $2000. I know of some restorers who charge up to $5000 to go through a set. The new valves are about half an inch too long and you spend a lot of time grinding them down to the size for proper adjustment. Once you are in there, you replace everything you can, as it is a long way back. Likewise you put in hardened exhaust seats so you can run unleaded fuel. The machine shop bill is higher because most machine shops have never seen a block where the deck isn?t perpendicular to the bore. Distributor caps are $1500 ? 2000. Whenever people know that a part is for a V12 they raise the price by 50 to 200% as they figure a guy with a 12 can afford it. The heads are often bad as they are aluminum and later owners didn?t change the coolant like they should, and sometimes they are welded to the steel studs, or worse an impatient back yard guy got rough and ruined the heads trying to get them off ? another $3000. The aluminum timing covers suffered from deterioration that lead to holes behind the water pump impeller and leaks coolant into the valve chamber – $1800 for a new cover. The front cover also has a less than perfect seal at the crank ? bore that out and put in a modern seal. Replace coils with modern inside the original case. Carb kits are double those for any other car ? see above, it is for a 12. Carbs suffer from damaged threads etc and a rebuilt one is $2500 and up. Oh, yes they were used on other cars like late Duesenberg Js, that helps. We have only talked about some of the things that you need to fix and haven?t even touched on cosmetics, chrome, polished studs, special fasteners that you have to make, etc. But that is only if you want it to look nice too, and you will, because when you have a 12, people want to see under the hood. But as far as I am concerned, it is all worth it. When you drive them, you always smile.
it is a nice find, but the way it sits, it would be a good value at between 6&8, 10 thousand at best. it will cost around 140,000 to get it back in shape, have fun finding parts. ask a man that owns one,
Bill McCoskey,
Do you remember the name of the guy in La Jolla?
Bill
The car is now in Georgia. In the early 70’s it was owned by a Tony Lopardo of Bakersfield, CA