1949 Gear box

[Tito Sobrinho]

I know this was discussed "ad nauseum". I'm going to refill the gear box with 80-90W  I've heard that the 90 W hypoid is a no,no which could damage the bronze ball bearings.
My question: The box has a small leak and for this reason can I mix half/half the  80-90W and STP, or just use the latter by itself.
Thanks for the answers.

[Jay Friedman]

Tito,

If you are referring to the steering gear box, I have replaced the 80-90W gear oil in mine, as follows.  After reading the previous CLC Forum thread on this subject and mulling over the suggested alternatives (all of which involve thicker oil or grease), I bought a ½ liter plastic bottle of Penrite Steering Box Lube for Vintage Cars (anything without rack and pinion steering), an Australian-made grease which flows.  It's sold in the US by the Restoration Supply Company in California and costs $17, plus about $10 shipping. 

When it arrived, I raised the front wheels off the ground, took off the left front wheel to provide better access to the steering box, drained the box by removing the lower inboard bolt on the end cover and by squeezing the bottle squirted in about 90% of the stuff.  To get it to settle in the box I had to turn the steering wheel from side to side a couple of times between squirts.  Couldn't get it all in, since when the bottle gets low, there is not enough pressure to make it squirt and the steering box was still not full.  I had an old tube of GM Steering Box Lube, also a flowing grease, which had been lying around my garage, so topped it up with that.  It doesn't seem to leak.

[Jim Stamper]

     About a year ago I discovered the steering box in my 37 Cadillac coupe was dry. That didn't come as a great surprise as there were many little things like that and the car had not been used. A lot of sorting still to do after a pretty good complete restoration. I doubted it had ever been filled. A friend gave me a jug of synthetic gear oil and I filled it with that, wondering if it would leak out. So far no drips and the car steers like it has power steering. Actually easier than I like in this era car, but good enough. Obviously the rest of the front end is in very good condition, or the steering would be considerably different.

[Tito Sobrinho]

Thanks Jay and Jim for the above recommendations.