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Lubing Rear Wheel Bearings, Grease instead of diff oil?

9K views 17 replies 10 participants last post by  Buckon37s 
#1 · (Edited)
Im wondering if i can get away with packing my rear wheel bearings with grease instead of having them lubed with diff oil?

Semi-float, Spidertrax Housing, Moser 40spline shafts, upgrading hi9 to mega9

I ask this because i need to completely top off my housing for a Mega9 pinion to be oiled properly, and my 40 spline moser shaft seals already like to leak, and now that the housing and tubes are going to be full its going to want to leak more. The Moser seals have always leaked (weeped) a little, and according to Moser they will just leak again even if they were new because of the amount of oil, and suggested i live with it. My thought is if i run inner seals to keep the oil from reaching the outer part of the tube, can i just lube my outer axle bearings with grease? I know this works for front applications, but you have a spindle and two sets of bearings helping with the loads? Moser also offers a sealed bearing but it is a standard roller bearing and not a tapered roller bearing, which is not as strong with side loads and for drag/street aplications.

since i am semi float, my bearings and seals are pressed on the shafts and held in place with a pressed on collar. Will Grease be enough lube for that one outer bearing? This setup would solve my leaky seals problem. The leak is minimal, but I am tired of wiping diff oil on my rotors
 
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#2 ·
I wouldn't trust it. That one bearing is carrying a lot of load. Also would be a major pain to pack.

I have no hard proof its just a opinion.
 
#3 ·
Maybe a different seal? I've never been impressed with moser...they did some work on one of my old axles, jacked it up...needless to say I'll never use them again. I haven't seen much engineering go into their products and their stuff really has not progressed over the past 10 years that I have witnessed.

Call Chase at ECGS and see if he has a better seal.
 
#4 ·
I have heared a lot of folks complain about their seal leaking with that much oil in the tubes, wish I had gone full float when i built the axle, so im kinda stuck with the Moser Shafts.

Both the guys at hi9 and Moser said seals are likely to leak at those fluid levels

pretty sure i could pack the bearings and even pack the tubes with a lot of grease, but yeah that one bearing sees a lot of work.
 
#5 ·
just an idea here, what if you put seals next to the diff, and filled each tube separately with the volume of oil that you wanted for the wheel bearings, you would obviously have to run a breather/fill hole for each tube, it would be a bit of a pain, but might be worth it.
 
#11 ·
I like this idea. Weld a bung on top so you can fill it easy.
 
#7 ·
zuzich26:15111617 said:
just an idea here, what if you put seals next to the diff, and filled each tube separately with the volume of oil that you wanted for the wheel bearings, you would obviously have to run a breather/fill hole for each tube, it would be a bit of a pain, but might be worth it.
This or sell it and build a full float.
 
#8 ·
Not the same application, but I put diff seals on my rear full float 14 bolt. I have the 14 flipped so I have to run an ungodly amount of oil to fill it up and all the tubes. I run front D60 hubs on the outers.

Get good grease, pack it well. I doubt you will have a problem.
 
#9 ·
I'm running inner axle seals on a semi float 8.8" right before the axle bearing and stock big bearing Ford bearings and outer seals. I have them packed with grease because I was having leaking problems. I currently have about 10K highway miles on it and no issues. I wanted to give it a try and it is easily reversible if I do have issues later on but so far so good.

Just don't pack too much grease in there, grease does hold in heat and there is a fine line between too much and "more grease is better right?".
 
#17 · (Edited)
thats my plan,

to seal the gear oil in....

just spoke with Sealsit.com, they make the seals for spidertrax and many other race applications, they make seals for all types of applications

turns out they have a seal that measures 2.25 OD (same as the inside of my spider housing) that i can press into the housing and will take a 40 spline. I will use two, side by side on the outer end of each tube, with grade 0 grease between them

very informative folks...
 
#18 ·
Just as an FYI- seals-it is vague on what they sell sometimes. I found that they have a standard that "does" fit a 35 spline but stretches so far that to go fast for longer periods of time, they have to make a custom seal that fits the shafts better. I would not be surprised if they have to do the same thing on the 40 spline. It's not a big deal, but be sure to talk to them about it, or you could end up with your bearings getting lubed anyway!
 
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