1956 Cadillac Power Antenna Rebuild

[stzomah]

1956 Cadillac Power Antenna:

I have had my car a long time (41 years).  It was my first car.  Around 1976 (I was 17) the original power antenna got bent and snapped off.  I took the original one out and replaced it with a fixed stainless staff antenna.  I stored the original antenna in the basement rafters of my Mom and Dad’s house.

Fast forward 40 years.  My Mom and Dad are gone and the house was sold (with the antenna in the rafter).  I was rebuilding the Caddy last year and had the whole front end apart.  I wanted to have that antenna back!  I started investigating and found that the 1956 Cadillac had a 1 year antenna!  Lucky me…  It is literally a “Hens Tooth”.

I had been searching EBay for about 3 months.  I heard of a mythical/phenomenon repairman named Klaus Wojak that everyone swore was the greatest antenna man on the planet.  I read that he was over 80 years old and may not be rebuilding them anymore?  I tried calling him a few times at his home in NC but it was winter and he lives in FL during that time of the year.

I ended up finding an antenna here on the CLC forum.  Another member with a couple 56 Caddys had at least 2 of them and was willing to sell one to me (MANY THANKS).  YAY!  I had it put into my car during the rebuild and on Father’s day last year, I picked the car up.  The antenna worked great, I ran it up and down about 5 times!

I continued to do a lot of work on the car this past summer.  I pulled the dashboard out and rebuilt the radio (other posts on this forum).  I put it all back together in late Oct and I turned on my new radio and tried the antenna…..nothing happened…the antenna had stopped working.

The weather was about to turn cold here in NJ so I climbed under and took the antenna out of the car for a winter project.  I also continued searching EBay and I bought a used 56 antenna with a broken mast from a guy in Canada.  It was not cheap $150 but if I need spare parts… I have everything but a spare mast.  I also wanted a test subject to pull apart without opening my prized intact antenna.  By the way, the masts are NOT AVAILABLE.  I have not found a supplier for either a reproduction or NOS anywhere… they are pure gold.

Well, it’s winter and it snowed here last Sat.  I went to the basement and started pulling the spare broken mast antenna apart and took mental notes on disassembly.  The first piece to come off was the 12V motor.  I was sure this was the problem with my good antenna.  I opened the motor and a brass ball bearing popped out of the casing stuck on the rotor shaft.  At first I thought the ball was the bearing but the actual slip bearing is the ID of the ball and OD of the shaft.  I soaked it in Kroil and pulled till it popped off the shaft.  The ball is held in place (in the casing) by metal tabs and a wick type material that was filling the void space around the ball.  This was the problem; the bearing was seized on the shaft.

While I had the motor apart, I figured I would take it fully apart and thoroughly clean and lubricate it.  I de-soldered the coil wires on the brushes board and took the entire rotor out of the stator body.  I could see the back bearing now.  It is the same as the front bearing.  I cleaned and put some lithium grease in it.  I put the rotor in a drill and used steel wool to clean the front shaft and commutator.  I then used a sharp pointed wire to clean out each commutator segment space.

I had problems putting the ball bearing back into the casing.  I used a pointed awl to push the tabs up from underneath but it was very difficult.  I ended up bending some of the tabs.  I bent them back as best I could then filled the voids with hot melt glue.  It appeared to work fine.  If you are lucky enough to get the motor apart with the ball still in the casing, you will not have this problem.  Mine was seized on the shaft so it popped out of the casing when it came apart.

I also had broken insulation on the blue and green wires.  I took the terminal tabs off the wire and used heat shrink tubing to cover the insulation breaks.  I soldered the terminal tabs back on.  The rubber grommets around the wiring in the case were shot.  I just filled them with hot melt glue to keep the water out of the motor.  Not pretty but better than water getting in.

I took the spare unit apart and taught myself how to disassemble the nylon cord drive that operates the mast.  I then pulled the good unit apart.  I cleaned everything and put lithium grease on the worm gear and the large sprocket.

I took the coax antenna cable off the unit.  I cleaned the connection and put it back on the mast tube.  I checked for continuity from the coax lead to the antenna and got only 7 ohms.  That’s close enough to continuity for this.

I put it all back together and used a spare 12V battery for the test.  I used a 10A fuse in line with the +POS test lead.  IT WORKED!  I put some light oil on the mast and ran it in and out about 15 times.  The motor was warm but not hot.  Normally you would not run the antenna up and down 15 times in a row!

I could not find a post anywhere on a 56 power antenna so here it is…Hope it is helpful to someone!

Cheers!

[David King (kz78hy)]

Nice write up Wayne, thanks for sharing.

David

[Lexi]

Wayne much thanks for a much needed write up. Clay/Lexi

[carguyblack]

Yes, thanks Wayne for taking the time to share your knowledge. I know one has to be very careful with melting etc., but it occurs to me that in my own history of working on these motors (a/c blowers, antennas etc.) that have these fused bearings, I have applied heat (torch) to the shaft to help soften any of the varnished grease and/or shrinking or expanding the metal differences just to free that bearing. I was not so lucky as you to be able to put it back in the metal seal as you did. It seemed to me that it rendered it quite useless once that brass ball came out of the socket. I recall heat saving the day on at least a couple of instances without melting the windings of the motor itself.
Chuck