Greg, 90 weight GL-1 available at any NAPA store.

Good points. But since prewar Packards, if decreasing postwar, were about refinement, we like to carry that approach to oils, grease, brake fluid, et al. Either a Chevron or Exxon Mobile tech told us back in 1979-80 that black moly/graph was developed for use in huge trucks in the hellish environment of stone quarries, open pit mines, and was a factor of eight times better than the prevailing orange fiber grease that had been around since at least the '40s.

If not driving in hard rain, using such modern grease should allow us to disregard the owners' manuals' every 2,000-mile dictum. Tho' there is something satisfying napping under the car with a mini grease gun filled with a CRC Sta-Lube Moly/Graph cartridge, seeing that still virginal former grease start to ooze from the far side of the fitting as the new ointment enters. When you live where the traffic has you under house arrest, you tend to do a lot of superfluous maintenance. 21 zerk fittings on my '47 SC model 2103.

Don't forget to check your steering gear, transmission, overdrive. Nothing but 90 weight GL-1 in all three. NAPA carries it. Support NAPA because they're the only auto parts chain that bothers to help old cars.

John, am sure PGH's grease fine, but we've done well with black molybdenum/graphite grease.

Tristar, like all 1942-on 356 engines, your '49 Custom uses a Carter WDO 531-S(A).
Here's a copy of a copy, and the print is small, should the attached help.

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PGH, your differential gets GL-5, EP (extreme pressure) which is for hypoid gears. Your manual transmission, overdrive, and steering gear are not hypoid, get GL-1. There've been entire threads on these forums detailing that.

My question was if there might be something better than GL-1 90 for our Gemmer steering boxes in 2025. If not, it's GL-1 90.

Thanks, Bwana. The '47 owner's manual says "straight mineral gear oil" for the steering gear, the 1946-1950 Packard Shop Manual "SAE 90 gear oil." But wondered if there were any improvements in this day and age. GL-1 90W it is, then.

Thank you, PGH, TXG, BigKev, all. For what it's worth, the 60-year-old alignment shop owner/operator, who's done not just GM-type i.f.s. as in 1941-on Clippers, but Safe-T-Flex also, suggests using STP, the original goop, in the steering box. I'm no fan of mouse milks, the only vetted use for STP i know being my late ex-War II Pacific motor pool staff sergeant, Packard service dept. 1946-47, then Hudson, GM dealerships mechanic, who before starting his own shop in 1959, specializing in transmissions -- rebuilt an Ultramatic for me decades ago with no more effort than an old HydraMatic, Borg-Warner, Dynaflow, TorqueFlite, et al -- used a mix of 50/50 STP/AFT as assembly lube.

However, saw this exchange on H.A.M.B. Jalopy Journal, thereon being many experienced souls, Packardites among them:

"Was talking to a buddy last night and he mentioned he has always used straight STP in his steering boxes as a lubricant. I wasn't aware it could be used for that. I'm curious to know if anybody has/is using it?

No! STP is not really a lubricant, it is a heavy dose of viscosity index improvers (long chain polymers, plastic) in a simple base oil. I wouldn't use that crap in anything, let alone use it as the sole lubricant in a steering box. This is one of those things where you just have to let people tell what they do, smile, and walk away."

So, sports fans, what's best for our Packard Gemmer steering boxes?

Can you gents make this loony traffic go away? Argh. As Morgan owner Jean Shepherd closed his WOR broadcasts, "It never ends, folks. It never e n d s."

Meanwhile, the 1940-1953 Chilton's Auto Repair Manual lists caster "1 1/2 degrees positive to 2 1/2 degrees positive," against the 1946-1950 Packard Shop Manual's "negative 2 degrees plus or minus half a degree." Why such a discrepancy? Were there reports from the field by the early '50s?

1940-1953 Chilton's gives 1/4 degree negative to 3/4 degree positive camber, the 1946-1950 Packard Shop Manual 0 plus or minus 1/2 degree.
Chilton's toe-in 0 inches, 1946-50 Packard Shop Manual 0 plus 1/16th of an inch, minus 0. So not much variance there. Then why the gulf in caster?

BdeB, somehow i missed page 30 in the front suspension chapter of the brown 1946-50 Packard Shop Manual. Right y'are, thanks. TXG renders some thoughtful theory. I'm running, again, bias-sized radials of the same 7.00 x 15 my car left the factory on when i was earlier running bias tires.

So, unless i hear from someone with a 1942-47 160/180, Super/Custom Super Clipper running Yokohama, Bridgestone, Michelin, etc. bias-sized 7.00 x 15 radials, guess -- and that's the word -- g u e s s i'll split the difference in the 1946-50 Packard Shop Manual.

Noting one of today's Photo of the Day, this was thoroughly debunked in the late, great, much missed Special Interest Autos and elsewhere back in the late '70s. It seems a new, equally gullible generation has joined those losing their minds/memories or thinking so-and-so having ridden in a car like theirs makes it better or worth more.

Abetted by down home museum displays of olive drabbed, blacked out Clippers--some of them postwar models at that -- and the internet, a new generation of buffs, or a forgetful older one, believe MacArthur had a '42 Packard Clipper staff car. If not riding in a Jeep, MacArthur was occasionally chauffeured in a '42 Cadillac Series 75 limousine belonging to the owner of a Philippine sugar plantation.

Ike, Bradley and some other high brass in Europe did get '42 One-Sixty Clippers.