Proper bearing buddies are excellent kit. Combined with packing Timken or the good Japanese brand with grease up front (whacking it down on your grease laden palm) and using genuine bearing buddies I found meant dunking the Vagabond' s trailer not to be a problem...many years of running and had no play. Cheers
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Boat: Seafarer Vagabond
Live: Great South East....love Moreton Bay fishing
Not really champ, you run both grease and oil. Pack the bearings as per normal , put on a speedi sleeve where the seal runs and you would rarely have a situation where the seal just “let go”. Marine grease seals are just about the most crap set up going around for keeping water out and most people don’t install them correctly anyway.
Give a man a fish & he will eat for a day !
Teach him how to fish
& he will sit in a boat - & drink beer all day!
TEAM MOJIKO
Chris - just a high quality marine grease. You’re only packing the races and not filling the hubs as you would normally. I then just use leg gearbox oil to top up. Key thing is the preparation of the axle shaft where the seal runs, best way to insure that is to use a speedi sleeve whether axle is new or old. You seriously won’t go back once you have them installed properly and you quickly see issues if water gets in via the clear windows. A lip seal with a spring garter is better positive seal than the old marine seal.
nothing wrong with not running them just do a thing called maintenance and check the rear seal visually and install them properly to begin with
the guys who give them a pump of grease every trip must have invented a device which can miraculously keep expanding where in reality they have normally blown the back seal out and stuffed it
nothing...but nothing in boats that is exposed to salt water is fool proof. over time.......nothing....
I dont really think it matters if you use dinky bearing buddies ..cheap bearing buddies...conventional bearings ...cheap bearings ....old style marine seals..etc etc....you need to look as often as you can and see whats happening....
I cant say Im right..but I have to immerse the trailer to launch the trireme...and so I replace the bearings every second year..and yes palm grease into the them... put cheap plastic gloves on..........cheap quick and thats that.....
Yep Durahubs were the best ever. Like Greg said, pack with grease first then rely on the engine honey stuff. Outboard gearbox oil is a good idea Packo! Mine and a mackerel pro I used to fish with would get them go milky white and not the nice golden colour like they started out at but they never let us down. Same before I started using them, heard all the horror stories but never let me down with 240-300 dunkings per year. It was all in the prep as per the instructions with emery paper. I initially wanted to run Sea Bears but Durahubs were cheap as by comparison.
With the exception of one failure ( through neglect) on my very first boat (live & learn)…….. any bearing mishap has been caused by the loss of a grease cap or bearing buddy .
I see more & more people using Loctite these days
Does it work using Loctite to secure bearing biddies or durahubs ?
Chris
Give a man a fish & he will eat for a day !
Teach him how to fish
& he will sit in a boat - & drink beer all day!
TEAM MOJIKO
I guess it would, but I have found that with genuine buddies, and making sure the "groove" where it fits into the hub is properly clean (I use acetone and a cotton bud) and you tap it in straight, they never fall off, lots come off from cheap thin buddies that just bend out of shape, and left over grease and oil/dirt on the hub.
I've noticed that the Easytow trailer for my Barcrusher has Loctite on them …… done at the factory
I've not lost a fair dinkum bearing buddy - when I've used them …… but you are right , the knock offs have come off on several occasions ( usually on big trips & bad roads) .
Curious if this use of Loctite is general practice
Chris
Give a man a fish & he will eat for a day !
Teach him how to fish
& he will sit in a boat - & drink beer all day!
TEAM MOJIKO
Democracy: Simply a system that allows the 51% to steal from the other 49%.
I used to use self amalgamating tape, a bastard to get off it is too hard to knock off easily. Used to lose a few at the ramps on overnighters before that.