Life, 1920-05-06 · page 37 of 56
Life — May 6, 1920 — page 37: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is **not a cartoon or satire** — it's a straightforward advertisement from Life magazine for Packard Motor Car Company's "Fuel-Izer" technology. The page promotes an engineering innovation: a fuel management system built into Packard automobiles that allegedly solved a major problem of the era — poor fuel combustion in gasoline engines. The ad claims the Fuel-Izer prevents carbon deposits, ensures clean spark plugs, enables quick cold-weather starting, and eliminates engine smoking. The visual shows a vintage Packard automobile with a technical diagram of the fuel system's components. The advertisement emphasizes that this feature comes standard on all new Packard cars and appeals to practical-minded buyers seeking "performance, economy and value." This reflects early automotive advertising's emphasis on mechanical innovation as a selling point — before features like styling or brand prestige dominated car marketing.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
Marvelous Achievement of Packard Engineering The“FUEL-IZER’” The FUEL-IZER Is built into the Packard earburetion ‘eyster. Dries and breaks op “wet” mixtore Does away with the formation of ‘carbon deposits. Insures clean epark plugs. Is entirely automatic — 0 working parts o adjustments, Prevents dilution of eylinder or crank case Insures quick and sure starting in ‘eold weather, Gi yt ae om ol AS sat cas Cotrter 1444 Pomel nd wet This Exclusive Packard Geature now Standard Equipment on every new Packard Car ITH the development of the Fuelizer, the engineers of the Packard Company have reached the goal for which motor car interests all over the world have been striving for many years. In short—they have achieved perfect combustionof all gradesof gasoline. * * * To the Packard owner, at least, the inefficient carburetion of gaso- line is no longer a source of worry and expense. Quick starting—with a tempera- ture of 11° above Zero, the Packard engine equipped with Fuelizer re- sponds perfectly to the throttle in 10 seconds. About 20 seconds after starting, the engine may be operated per- fectly on a normal mixture—no need of choking motor. Tests made at 5° below Zero show that the engine is able to pull on high gear almost immediately. Freedom from carbon—not one single case of foul spark plugs or valves, combustion chamber walls or piston rings, developed in the months of testing after the perfec- tion of the Fuelizer. Complete combustion of fuel is shown by the absence of oil dilution in the crankcase. The Fuelizer does away with this main cause of wear on engine bearings and scor- ing of cylinder walls. It does away with sticky valve guides and valve stems. Freedom from smoking was demonstrated by the clean exhaust, due primarily to the fact that the Fuelizer works at the maximum when engine is starting and idling. The Fuelizer is about the simplest invention anybody ever saw to mean so much. It consists essentially of a pipe, a chamber and a spark plug. It weighs less than two pounds. It is automatically regulated by the varying degree of suction ex- erted by the engine as the throttle is opened or closed. Not a moving part—notanadjustmentanywhere. * * & A Packard feature. Exclusively Packard. In every way an achievement that must strengthen the appeal of the Packard Car to the practical-mind- ed man whois looking for passenger transportation on the basis of per- Sormance, economy and value. “Ask the Man (@) Who Owns One’”’ comicbooks.com