gm280
Supreme Mariner
- Joined
- Jun 26, 2011
- Messages
- 14,605
Hey guys, I got a good one for you all. I am presently working on my complete refurbish (okay a total rebuild) of a boat, motor and trailer. Last week I removed the axle assembly from under the trailer to rework the entire assembly and repaint. So I took off the last 4 bolt wheel hub and what did I see... The PO (I hope anyways) at some previous time decided to replace the bearings and seals. Now that isn't a bad idea if they?re bad, UNLESS you buy the wrong size grease seal. He put a 1.5" grease seal on a 1.25" axle bearing area. So there was literally no contact what so ever with the sealing surface. And then he was wondering why he had such water problems...SMH! What keyed me off to find this was that fact that once I took the seal out the back of the hub, it looked like new. There was zero wear on it and that made me wonder why. So I took the seal and slide it on the axle and it didn?t touch anywhere on the entire axle from one side to the other... I guess since it fit the hub he thought everything was A-Okay... And I ?m sure he wondered why his bearings were so pitted and rusted... I fixed that entire problem and replaced both sides with brand new 5 bolt hubs, bearings, races and seal...problem solved. Doing your own maintenance is a great idea IF you know how to do it correctly. Otherwise you CAN cause a huge problem. :facepalm:
