How much grease in trailer hubs | GTAMotorcycle.com

How much grease in trailer hubs

JoeRider

JoeRider

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I am repacking the bearings on my HF trailer that I use for my MX bike and have a concern as to how much grease to put into the hub.

Last season I filled the hub completely in grease (not the dust cap) and didn't have any issues. Now that I cleaned the hubs I noticed the grease was only discolored (dark brown/black) around the bearings (inner and outer) and the rest looked new. It took quite a bit of time to clean everything and seems like a waste; is it common practice to fill the hub completely?

I read several other forums, one person suggested to pack the bearings and fill the hub completely if it is used in a marina (boat) otherwise packing the bearings is fine for a utility trailer. Another poster mentioned over greasing causes "elevated temperatures in the bearing housing" which can lead to "a catastrophic failure of the bearing system".

My trailer itself only weighs ~150lbs with a 250lbs MX bike.

Do you pack the bearings and fill the hub completely in grease or is packing the bearings fine?

References:
http://forums.iboats.com/trailers-towing/how-much-grease-do-you-put-your-hubs-541704.html
http://www.practicalmachinist.com/vb/general/ot-how-much-grease-wheel-hub-230813/

 
The empty void in the hub isn't that important. It's right in the roller cage that is important. Get yourself a bearing packer , or failing that, fill a sandwich baggie full of high quality bering grease.....put bearing in, and knead away till you are more than certain you have completely packed the cage and rollers with clean grease.
 
omnivore said:
The empty void in the hub isn't that important. It's right in the roller cage that is important. Get yourself a bearing packer , or failing that, fill a sandwich baggie full of high quality bering grease.....put bearing in, and knead away till you are more than certain you have completely packed the cage and rollers with clean grease.
Click to expand...

Perfect.

Thanks.
 
I got a spring loaded grease cap set for our hf trailer from princess auto for $12 :)

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Thoroughly clean and dry your bearings (Do not spin them with compressed air). After that inspect them for wear. After that pack the bearings with fresh clean grease. You will notice in the hub, just after the bearing race there is a shallow channel of sorts. Fill this with grease and your good to go.
 
I have and always have put on my trailers Bearing Buddies. They are spring loaded feeders. Grease is cheap. Before I go anywhere I pump a couple of shots of fresh grease in and the buddies will feed grease as needed. Ever since I started using the bearing buddies I have never had an issue with bearings. Every couple of years I pull the bearings out and clean and check them and they've always been like the day I put them in.
 
For my future reference:

I packed the bearings thoroughly using a bearing packer and put grease on both sides of each of the two races. Once the hub was installed the spindle smeared the grease everywhere inside the hub.

Next spring we'll see how the bearings and grease held up. As a last resort, I'll invest in bearing buddies.

Thanks for the quick replies and great info.
JoeRider
 
Well, I did not have bearing packer nor was I ready to destroy hub seal to get inner
bearing out. I cleaned it as much as possible with carb cleaner and once dry I
smeared grease everywhere and once that was done I closed the hub and pumped
grease through grease fitting until hub caps popped out from pressure :)
It should be enough, after hour of 120kmph driving hubs were few degrees warmer than the rest.
 
Germax said:
Well, I did not have bearing packer nor was I ready to destroy hub seal to get inner
bearing out. I cleaned it as much as possible with carb cleaner and once dry I
smeared grease everywhere and once that was done I closed the hub and pumped
grease through grease fitting until hub caps popped out from pressure :)
It should be enough, after hour of 120kmph driving hubs were few degrees warmer than the rest.
Click to expand...

I did that years ago, for the same reason of not destroying the $5 seal... The bearings wore to the point of needing to be changed within a year (and I don't put a lot of miles on my trailer).

I do the job right now with no issues since.
 
there is nothing more horrible than being on the side of the road in the dark taking a hub apart. Grease is cheap, bearing packer is $15 bucks and bearing buddies are $35 a set and your good for life. My time is worth more than $35 an hour when its 9pm on sunday and I'm sitting in a ditch on the 400.
 
You can remove the inner bearing with out damaging the seal, I use a small pry bar to remove the seal.
 
I just needed trailer on the road asap. It is not matter of few bucks but of getting all the right parts on time. I have no clue what is the size of the seals for one. I broke grease fitting and barely managed to get replacement. Ask for help anywhere and all you get are blank looks. Mostly in Canadian tire and princes auto. So I packed it until grease was popping out. I check hubs and they are not hot. Once I have some time I will do it right. For now I'm off dirt biking ;-)
 
I picked up a HF trailer this week and have been putting it together and trying to figure out the right way to grease the bearings.

After doing some reading I'm not convinced the 'brute force' method of popping the grease seal and inner bearing out is a good idea, as the seal and inner bearing itself may easily be damaged by this method.

For the few bucks they cost, I'm going to order some extra seals from this site:

http://www.avxseals.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=TC30x52x10

I ordered 10 (to get 20% off) and had them shipped to my US mailbox so if anyone wants a couple let me know.
 
Since the question has already been answered... Pegasus can teach you how to grease your axles!
 
"Bearing Buddies" are not a substitute for packing the bearings.
If you want the bearings to last you MUST pack them.
Any lube that is not on the rolling elements of the bearing is wasted lube. "Bearing Buddies" let you pack the cavity with grease but don't get much grease on the rolling elements of the outer bearing and ZERO grease on the inner.
I NEVER re-use seals. If the seals are still good, why are you removing the wheel? Seals are cheap and readily available. Locally try Seal Tech or Seals Unlimited or any reputable bearing house.
 
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bitzz said:
Locally try Seal Tech or Seals Unlimited or any reputable bearing house.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the tip, kicking myself that I didn't find out about Seals Unlimited sooner. They are located very close to me :)

http://www.sealsunlimited.ca

They are apparently a distributor for SKF seals, apparently the SKF part number is 692373. Since I've already ordered the ones from AVX I'm not going to bother trying to get them.
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