Wheel Bearing Grease Seal Confusion

[New Adventures]

There are many posts here from folks (perhaps retired mechanics, etc. based on their posts) who imply that the easy lube feature is a non-functional gimmick that should never be used. Perhaps the "old fashioned way" is by far the best way but as someone with no knowledge on the matter I have to wonder if this really is an all or nothing matter. If the easy lube feature is useless I have to wonder why ETI (and other manufacturers) would install it and send new owners on their way telling them to just squirt some grease in each year. Also, if the feature is useless and fraught with safety risk, why do US and Canadian authorities allow it to be installed? Thousands of trailers are sold each year with some sort of easy lube feature - are the owners who use them experiencing failure at epidemic proportions? If the easy lube feature is a useless gimmick or creates safety concerns why aren't consumer advocacy groups filing lawsuits against the manufacturers of the products? Is doing it the "old fashioned way" more the peace of mind of knowing (by physically seeing) rather than presuming that the easy lube feature is doing its job. I have always been a maintenance overachiever and am inclined to learn to manually repack bearings (or hire someone to do it) but I am struggling to really understand why so many assert that there is no benefit to the easy lube feature that ETI elects to include on its trailers. Could it be that there is some benefit for the mechanically challenged that is good enough while being not good enough for the backyard mechanic? There is a lot of discussion about manually repacking bearings but not much much detail on the "why" the easy lube feature is or is not useful. I look forward to learning from those with more experience. Thanks.

[padlin]

I've been on RV forums for 12 years now. I've yet to read about someone recommending the use of EZ-Lubes for anything but boats however both my trailers have had them. I tried them once, 10 years ago and not since.

You'd have to ask ETI why they use made them standard to get the real reason ut as a guess, I'm thinking they must have had a majority of folks asking for them when they used to be an option. They sure sound like they would make life easier, however they don't.

[Donna D.]

Sounds like I'm really in the minority. I like the EZ-Lube feature and purposely bought that axle when I replaced the one on my Scamp. Like anything, there is a right way and a wrong way to use the feature. The ones you'll hear from are those that didn't use it properly. Do you ever need to hand pack or inspect the bearings. Of course, brakes too. Ten Forward is almost 4 years old. Every year from new, I greased the bearings with the EZ-Lubes, until 3 years. Then took it in to the shop and had everything checked, seals replaced etc. I was told everything looked really good. Obviously I'm doing something right.

[thoer]

A mechanic told me that they are good for boat trailers. Driving to the put in spot , the whole assembly gets warm and then when plunged into cold water it can suck some water in, past the seals from the large temperature difference.The water contaminated grease can then be forced out. I’ve got no first hand knowledge on that, so take it for what it’s worth as secondhand at best.

[Iowa Dave]

Originally Posted by thoer

A mechanic told me that they are good for boat trailers. Driving to the put in spot , the whole assembly gets warm and then when plunged into cold water it can suck some water in, past the seals from the large temperature difference.The water contaminated grease can then be forced out. I’ve got no first hand knowledge on that, so take it for what it’s worth as secondhand at best.

The standard device I’m familiar with is a bearing buddy. The hub cap has a floating disc,
Has a spring and an O ring seal. The whole assembly gets hot going down the
road. When the trailer is backed in to cold water,
the floating disc is sucked in, keeping the water out of the axle spindle area. Theoretically the plate can only retract so far and will not compress the the grease so tightly that it pushes the back seal out. A zerk on the center of the floating cap allows a shot of bearing grease to be added occasionally to replace what little is screeded off by the in and out action of the outer O ring seal. We used them with success on boat trailers but not on dry land trailers. I have easy lube axles in the 21 but prefer to tear it down, check for roller play, cr lean the bearing up and hand grease and carefully reassemble. Not too tight not too loose, no cotter key on these new ones and one person’s hand right might be either too much or too loose.
Iowa Dave

[Tonny LR]

Dave,
I got questions for you. After you hammered out the inner bearing and seal using appropriete sizes of sockets, do you re-use the inner bearing and use a new seal?. If you do re-use the inner bearing, what solent do you use to clean it? do you spray it with brake cleanner fluid for a quick drying process?. If there is a little bit of free play exist even tighten the hub with 50 lbs torque and release a quarter turn of the retaining nut and the wheel move freely, is it an indication that the bearings needed to be replaced. Thanks.

Tonny LR

[Brian B-P]

Both Bearing Buddies (an aftermarket product probably not endorsed by Dexter Axle) and E-Z Lube are for boat trailers on which the bearings are submerged during launching and retrieving. The idea of a Bearing Buddy is to maintain sufficient pressure on the grease to keep water from entering at the seals; the idea of E-Z Lube is to provide an easy way to flush water-contaminated grease out without disassembling the hub. Neither has anything to do with proper bearing maintenance in normal road service... but if you want to use a lot of extra grease when replacing the grease after servicing, you can use the E-Z Lube fitting to do that.

[Iowa Dave]

Originally Posted by Brian B-P

Both Bearing Buddies (an aftermarket product probably not endorsed by Dexter Axle) and E-Z Lube are for boat trailers on which the bearings are submerged during launching and retrieving. The idea of a Bearing Buddy is to maintain sufficient pressure on the grease to keep water from entering at the seals; the idea of E-Z Lube is to provide an easy way to flush water-contaminated grease out without disassembling the hub. Neither has anything to do with proper bearing maintenance in normal road service... but if you want to use a lot of extra grease when replacing the grease after servicing, you can use the E-Z Lube fitting to do that.

Yup, that’s how I see it too Brian. I’ve see the bearing buddies be sucked in about a half an inch just as the trailer comes out of the water if it was a warm trip to the ramp. When you come back in to get the trailer and load the boat the disc is all the way back out to the snap ring that holds the assy. ( the auto correct called it an Assyrian.) there’s probably about an inch of travel possible till the spring is fully compressed, I can’t quite remember.
Iowa Dave

[Iowa Dave]

Originally Posted by Tonny LR

Dave,
I got questions for you. After you hammered out the inner bearing and seal using appropriete sizes of sockets, do you re-use the inner bearing and use a new seal?. If you do re-use the inner bearing, what solent do you use to clean it? do you spray it with brake cleanner fluid for a quick drying process?. If there is a little bit of free play exist even tighten the hub with 50 lbs torque and release a quarter turn of the retaining nut and the wheel move freely, is it an indication that the bearings needed to be replaced. Thanks.

Tonny LR

Hi Tonny,
I was thinking about you the other day when I was down in my shop and saw my 10 inch Lodge Dutch oven. That was the best peach cobbler I ever ate at Scott County Park. If you use a Socket that makes full contact with the bearing and if you are square on it, it will drive out without bending up the casing that holds the roller bearings. To clean them up
I wipe them down with a paper shop towel (blue one) then working outside I drop
the wiped down bearings into an empty soup can and pour in a little gasoline. I let them set for a few minutes 3 or 4 and then I take a screwdriver or a pencil, whatever and put it in the can with the pencil in the center of the bearing. Then I swish it around and what little grease
Was in there is cleaned out. Take it out and wipe it down and let dry. DO NOT SPIN IT UP
With the air compressor to dry it off. Once dry there will be some play in the bearing. Thats where you force The grease in with your palm and your thumbs. Put some grease on the spindle, a little where the new seal drives in and put things back together. The wheel should not wobble once you back the nut off. And when you spin the tire there should be no “rumble”. This is how I do it. Others may have other merhods or opininions. I bought my first boat and trailer when I was 15, before I could drive. And I’ve been greasinf bearings ever since.
Iowa Dave

[Iowa Dave]

Originally Posted by Donna D.

Sounds like I'm really in the minority. I like the EZ-Lube feature and purposely bought that axle when I replaced the one on my Scamp. Like anything, there is a right way and a wrong way to use the feature. The ones you'll hear from are those that didn't use it properly. Do you ever need to hand pack or inspect the bearings. Of course, brakes too. Ten Forward is almost 4 years old. Every year from new, I greased the bearings with the EZ-Lubes, until 3 years. Then took it in to the shop and had everything checked, seals replaced etc. I was told everything looked really good. Obviously I'm doing something right.

Donna,
We have the EZ Lube on the 21. After we got It home from Arizona and before we headed to Chilliwack to get solar put on and see the country, I wanted to look at the brakes. I took things apart. I had one leaking wheel seal which I replaced. Bearings were fine, not over greased etc. I think where people have a problem may be not rotating the tire/hub/bearings as they pump the grease in. That would be my guess. Otherwise I’m sure it’s a viable system especially if the person pumping in the grease understands how much grease comes out of the gun on each pump. Nobody likes to disassemble and reassemble multiple times but it isa way to learn how much grease is being applied if you count the pumps. Dave and Donna’s mileage will vary. She drives fast and Dave is always going against the wind.
Iowa Dave

[Brian B-P]

Properly servicing bearings like this every three years should be fine, even without grease flushes at shorter intervals. On my 1984 Toyota Tercel - which has essentially identical bearings in the rear to these trailers - the only time that I ever disassembled the bearings was to service the brakes, and I only had to do that a couple of times over the years. I never added grease between servicings (there was no way to do so), and never replaced the bearings (just the seal). I scrapped the car after only 352,000 km (over 200K miles) and 17 years, so I don't know how long the bearings would have lasted.

[thoer]

An '84 Tercel was the first new car I ever bought. Drove it for many years, sold it to a buddy, he drove it for many more years, and then when his kids got old enough it passed from one to the other until one finally wrecked it - kid was unhurt luckily. While I had it the only thing I ever had to replace that wasn't normal maintainence was the heater fan motor I think. And if I remember correctly it was the mice who killed that motor.

[Iowa Dave]

When I was a kid working in the filling station with my dad a customer came
in and said he could hear noises in the front end. We pulled the wheel and the wheel bearings were shot, just shredded and coming apart. The customer had bought the car new and said the bearings had never been serviced. It was a late 50s Buick and had 92,000 miles on it. We replaced everything that needed it. Did both front wheels though-the one was still ok. Seal had conked out on the bad one.
Iowa Dave

[Oldtimer]

Dave reading the way you clean n repack bearings brought back a ton of memories of being on the farm and do it just that way with my dad n grandpa many a time on all the equipment. That the best way to do it.

[Tonny LR]

Originally Posted by Iowa Dave

Hi Tonny,
I was thinking about you the other day when I was down in my shop and saw my 10 inch Lodge Dutch oven. That was the best peach cobbler I ever ate at Scott County Park. If you use a Socket that makes full contact with the bearing and if you are square on it, it will drive out without bending up the casing that holds the roller bearings. To clean them up
I wipe them down with a paper shop towel (blue one) then working outside I drop
the wiped down bearings into an empty soup can and pour in a little gasoline. I let them set for a few minutes 3 or 4 and then I take a screwdriver or a pencil, whatever and put it in the can with the pencil in the center of the bearing. Then I swish it around and what little grease
Was in there is cleaned out. Take it out and wipe it down and let dry. DO NOT SPIN IT UP
With the air compressor to dry it off. Once dry there will be some play in the bearing. Thats where you force The grease in with your palm and your thumbs. Put some grease on the spindle, a little where the new seal drives in and put things back together. The wheel should not wobble once you back the nut off. And when you spin the tire there should be no “rumble”. This is how I do it. Others may have other merhods or opininions. I bought my first boat and trailer when I was 15, before I could drive. And I’ve been greasinf bearings ever since.
Iowa Dave

Hi Dave,
We thoroughly enjoyed Scott County Park. Hopefully, we can go to the Mississippi River Valley Ralley next year and again cook cobbler. Thanks for your response.

Tonny LR

[New Adventures]

Originally Posted by Donna D.

Sounds like I'm really in the minority. I like the EZ-Lube feature and purposely bought that axle when I replaced the one on my Scamp. Like anything, there is a right way and a wrong way to use the feature. The ones you'll hear from are those that didn't use it properly. Do you ever need to hand pack or inspect the bearings. Of course, brakes too. Ten Forward is almost 4 years old. Every year from new, I greased the bearings with the EZ-Lubes, until 3 years. Then took it in to the shop and had everything checked, seals replaced etc. I was told everything looked really good. Obviously I'm doing something right.

Your approach makes sense to me. The EZ Lube feature is not a complete replacement for manual inspection, replacement or greasing but supplements maintenance and may reduce the frequency of doing it the hard way. Thanks for sharing your experience.

[New Adventures]

Originally Posted by Brian B-P

Both Bearing Buddies (an aftermarket product probably not endorsed by Dexter Axle) and E-Z Lube are for boat trailers on which the bearings are submerged during launching and retrieving. The idea of a Bearing Buddy is to maintain sufficient pressure on the grease to keep water from entering at the seals; the idea of E-Z Lube is to provide an easy way to flush water-contaminated grease out without disassembling the hub. Neither has anything to do with proper bearing maintenance in normal road service... but if you want to use a lot of extra grease when replacing the grease after servicing, you can use the E-Z Lube fitting to do that.

Thanks, this helps me understand the EZ Lube feature a bit better.

[Greg A]

Originally Posted by Donna D.

Sounds like I'm really in the minority. I like the EZ-Lube feature and purposely bought that axle when I replaced the one on my Scamp. Like anything, there is a right way and a wrong way to use the feature. The ones you'll hear from are those that didn't use it properly. Do you ever need to hand pack or inspect the bearings. Of course, brakes too. Ten Forward is almost 4 years old. Every year from new, I greased the bearings with the EZ-Lubes, until 3 years. Then took it in to the shop and had everything checked, seals replaced etc. I was told everything looked really good. Obviously I'm doing something right.

You’re probably more in the majority I would bet. Many trailers use this system now and as in anything there will be some horror stories, but I think overall it is a small percentage.

I used the ez lube right before Quartzsite and found it to be a very good experience. On the advice of my long haul trucker buddies, I’ll probably go past 5+ years before thinking about manually inspecting and repacking.

If some feel more comfortable manually repacking bearings annually on four hubs, then I’d consider that as part of the hobby for them and they enjoy that aspect. I prefer a different approach on bearings, and haven’t ever had any experiences that it’s not working fine through 6 trailers.

You just need to do what’s comfortable for you whichever way, but I wouldn’t be overly concerned about the ez lube system if you follow the many videos that explain how to do it properly.

[Iowa Dave]

Originally Posted by Oldtimer

Dave reading the way you clean n repack bearings brought back a ton of memories of being on the farm and do it just that way with my dad n grandpa many a time on all the equipment. That the best way to do it.

Hi Dave,
I learned from my Dad, I always figured if it was the way he was shown to keep gun trailers, trucks and tanks rolling where stuff breaking down had consequences far beyond the inconvenience of setting along the road, it was good enough for me. I get more satisfaction from doing for myself than swiping or inserting a credit card. And writing a check is downright painful.
Dave

[Great Eggstrications]

While I'm not sure exactly how or why this thread went from my grease seal confusion to a discussion of proper greasing methodology (although I recognize that that's part of the charm of these kinds of forums), I think that next September when it's time for my annual inspect and repack, and just to satisfy my curiosity, before pulling the wheels and drums off I'll do the E-Z-Lube routine on one of the wheels and compare it to an un-E-Z-Lubed hub and see what really goes on inside with E-Z-Lube.

Meanwhile, I'm bowing out of the debate till next September...