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Does anyone know what thick grease GM used inside the tilt/telescopic steering column?
I'm referring to grease on the bearings, the white plastic sphere on the shaft, and other places like plastic gear? And what new thick grease would be equivalent that would work with the existing GM grease and is plastic safe? I was going to use wheel bearing grease until I found out it can/will damage plastic.
I'm going to be replacing the key lock cylinder, and figured I might as well dig a little deeper to put thread lock on the 4 E8 bolts that seem to come loose and go ahead and put in oversized pivot pins to help reduce any wheel slop. And figured I'd add some grease to the ball bearings and other places while I'm there and it's apart. Not doing a rebuild, just going to add grease to whatever is there.
I've seen some people mention using white lithium grease. Which that's not the grease GM used, and I generally don't use white lithium grease as it dries out over time.
Here are some pics I found on the forum to show what I'm referring to as far as ball bearings. Looks like they cleaned off the factory grease and added new grease:
This is a pic showing the white plastic sphere on the shaft that is greased. So needs to be plastic safe:
I've attached a snipet from the factory shop manual regarding the grease.
Don't have the time to make a nice post so here is a search string to put into your favorite internet search engine which will search the topic on this forum. Jim Shea was an engineer that worked for Saginaw steering and helped to design your steering column so I would think his information would be credible on this topic. Also heed his warnings about what NOT to lube.
site:corvetteforum.com jim shea tilt grease
While I agree that dried up old white lithium grease seems bad keep in mind that there are lots of original unserviced columns 50 years old or older which still work just fine. If you aren't the engineer how do you know what lubrication is "better"? If it lasted this long did it fail? If it lasted this long will you care about the lube in that column in 50 years?
I've attached a snipet from the factory shop manual regarding the grease.
Don't have the time to make a nice post so here is a search string to put into your favorite internet search engine which will search the topic on this forum. Jim Shea was an engineer that worked for Saginaw steering and helped to design your steering column so I would think his information would be credible on this topic. Also heed his warnings about what NOT to lube.
site:corvetteforum.com jim shea tilt grease
While I agree that dried up old white lithium grease seems bad keep in mind that there are lots of original unserviced columns 50 years old or older which still work just fine. If you aren't the engineer how do you know what lubrication is "better"? If it lasted this long did it fail? If it lasted this long will you care about the lube in that column in 50 years?
Thanks. I have already read some of his stuff in the downloads thing I saw people posting and did read about not greasing shoes. Had been doing research on what exactly he was talking about. And I assume no grease in the grooves of the two metal bars as seen in the below photo? And no grease in the two bar things you see at the top of the housing in the below 2nd photo?
If I have the correct locations NOT to grease. I believe he's saying if you grease those areas, then the steering wheel's "tilt" may could change without you engaging the tilt lever.
Also, I'll do research on "lithium soap based grease". Kinda strange as I read lithium is bad for plastic. But I'll search around to see what lithium soap based greases are available at the local auto parts store. And I'm thinking white lithium grease is different than lithium soap based grease. It doesn't look like GM used white lithium grease since the grease in the photos I've seen look like something similar to wheel bearing grease.
I came across this under the tilt/telescopic section of the C4 manual when I searched for "lithium":
"Lubricant .......... Lithium Base Grease No. 1051344 or Equivalent Meeting GM-6031-M"
Those first couple of pictures are mine from a column I restored for my 69. I use the Mobile 1 Synthetic red grease as it does meet the GM spec. I think I just sent you a message as well.
Those first couple of pictures are mine from a column I restored for my 69. I use the Mobile 1 Synthetic red grease as it does meet the GM spec. I think I just sent you a message as well.
What grease for steering column internals?
