favorite wheel bearing grease ?

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favorite wheel bearing grease ?

Postby jethro » Mon Oct 12, 2015 11:13 pm

About to put in new rear wheel bearings when I re-assy rear axle.
are there wheel bearing greases that are considered better than whatever ford or dodge would use ?

I have used lucas red-and -sticky in my tractor-
and sta-lube graphite/molly for steering gear and u joints in cars-

recommendations ?

Tim
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Re: favorite wheel bearing grease ?

Postby matthewh » Mon Oct 12, 2015 11:25 pm

I think you'll find this one of them questions everybody has a favorite, but it all does the same thing. Something to consider, your axle is a free floating type, so the bearings do receive gear oil from the housing. A member here has mentioned they lost a wheel bearing due to grease buildup which didn't allow oil to flow properly.
Personally, I use Carquest brand, Disc brake wheelbearing grease. I pack them like any other cone style bearing, only I don't pack in between the bearings like I would with a front hub or trailer axle hub. That way, the bearings have grease, but there's room oil as well.
'93 W350 5spd Getrag, 4.10 gears, 83k miles and counting, Mods: LPPP AKA Ma Dually
'54 Dodge M37 6.2/700R4/205, 5.89 gears, WC rear axle
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Re: favorite wheel bearing grease ?

Postby CumminsPower59 » Tue Oct 13, 2015 5:08 am

I've always repacked the rear bearings just the same as the front, but that being said, the rear bearings are oil bath, and the next time I dig into them, I am going to just slop them up in gear oil and toss them in, and jack up one side and let the oil flow into the hub and do the same for the other side.
Ike

91 W350 SRW, 3.07's, NV4500, 370's, THD LPPP, Super HX40, 2nd gen IC swap, BHAF, Isspro's, 2" lift, 285's on 3rd gen 17"'s.
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Re: favorite wheel bearing grease ?

Postby thrashingcows » Tue Oct 13, 2015 8:35 pm

CumminsPower59 wrote:I've always repacked the rear bearings just the same as the front, but that being said, the rear bearings are oil bath, and the next time I dig into them, I am going to just slop them up in gear oil and toss them in, and jack up one side and let the oil flow into the hub and do the same for the other side.


Not sure if I was who Matthew was making reference too or not...but I had one get cooked due to a "grease dam" that built up around the bearing. Now I do exactly as CumminsPower59 mentioned. Have not had an issue since. I give it a good 10-15 minutes for the oil to move into the hub on each side. Make sure you check your diff oil level the next day or so to make sure the level didn't drop too much. ;)
1984/93 Dodge Crewcab, W350, 1 Ton SRW, long box, 330K Km's, M&H spacer, 366 spring, fuel pin to deep side, 14cm housing, Piston LP, PS IC, Isspro Boost, Pyro and tach, NV4500, 29 spline NP205, 3.54's.


Check out the build....http://www.dieseltruckresource.com/dev/ ... 05923.html
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Re: favorite wheel bearing grease ?

Postby jethro » Tue Oct 13, 2015 9:02 pm

Yes- somewhere I remember reading to stand the whole axle up on its end to let it flood into the bearings.
I have it on the stand now so I can lift it with the chain hoist to do that.
I think the manual mentioned using 1 ounce of grease-
I guess it might be good to figure out what grease is soluble (most soluble?) in the rear end oil ???????
I will be putting in a Detroit truetrac so It will be some kind of non-synthetic gear oil.....
I will have to take the axles in and out several times during the diff setup so I guess I will need some grease in them.....

Tim
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Re: favorite wheel bearing grease ?

Postby CumminsPower59 » Wed Oct 14, 2015 10:57 am

Once you get the diff dialed in, then do the wheel bearings. In the past, I've just used regular petroleum based wheel bearing grease, and it's dissolved with the gear oil over a short time. Prior experience with larger axles (military applications), I put just a thin skim coat on the bearings so there would be a little lubrication on them (but not in between the rollers), set the preload, and buttoned it all up. Then I would verify that the differential was full of gear oil, jack up one side a good 4-6" up and let it sit. The gear oil would run into the low side and fill the cavity with oil. Depending on the temperature of the oil, I'd let it sit for 20-30 minutes, level it back out, top off the diff, and lift the other side and let it sit of some time too, level it back out, check level again, top off and take it for a short test run with as little braking as possible to keep the heat out of the hubs as I'd check the hub temperature with a infrared thermometer. If all was cool and happy, I'd kick it out the door. One thing I did was when I was replacing the gear oil was heat it up to a good 120+ degrees so it would flow easily.

No need to stand the axle on its end, sounds like a lot of work :lol:
Ike

91 W350 SRW, 3.07's, NV4500, 370's, THD LPPP, Super HX40, 2nd gen IC swap, BHAF, Isspro's, 2" lift, 285's on 3rd gen 17"'s.
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Re: favorite wheel bearing grease ?

Postby jethro » Sat Oct 17, 2015 7:43 pm

Yes- that was about what I was thinking- a modest amount of grease in the bearing.
"stand on end" was more a figure of speech- I was really thinking maybe a foot of altitude change on each end.
I have the axle in a steel rack that looks like a wehigtlifting bench. (4 wheel engine dolly with 2 uprights )
Will be easy to lift one side then the other. Ill just hook the chain hoist up to the ceiling to raise one side at a time.
Good idea warming up the oil a bit. Used to see my dad do that with STP and motor oil to make the addative go into
the oil without clumping up. (probably would disperse under heat and "mixer action" when running in engine.)

May try to whip up a tool to spread the cake to make the diff shimming easier. May try to make it to also spread the front
too if I have to do the daina up front later on.

Thanks for the verification of the idea.....

Tim
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