moly grease with bronze bushings?

Joined
Mar 12, 2012
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12
Location
Santa Rosa, Ca
I have a classic bmw motorcycle that uses these insanely expensive mini tapered roller bearings for the paralever final drive. these are driveshaft bikes. no chains. in the late 80s they went from one pivot at the swingarm to dual pivots. one added at the final drive. these don't move very much and tend to eat up the bearings. some people think bmw motorcycles are really hard to work on and expensive. actually most parts are very reasonable and things cross over to most automotive parts. these bearings are not one of those parts. only made by FAG they're expensive and you need two.

so a company has made a bronze bushing kit with steel pins. they provide moly grease but from online searches I've read that moly isn't good with bronze.

I'd appreciate some insight so I can avoid another issue when installing these.



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High content moly paste is commonly recommended for these types of bushing in this type of application. Honda recommended Molykote Gn paste for the rear shock bronze bushings, I never had one fail and some had been lubed with it over a decade.
 
Never heard of a problem with moly and bronze. Depending on how heavily loaded these are you could look to something that meets Cat 5% moly. My recommendation would probably be Schaeffer 219.
 
Bronze normally just needs a good non moly grease if using moly I would stay under 5%.
Over 5% in frictionless bearing can be abrasive.

That said bronze is kinda self lubricating so with or with out moly I think you are fine a nice water proof high dropping point grease is good.
 
There is a difference between bronze and oilite bronze. Moly can clog the oil pores. Since these are relubed parodically, not an issue. But a electric motor with lifetime oilite bearings it is a NO.

Rod
 
I have a classic bmw motorcycle that uses these insanely expensive mini tapered roller bearings for the paralever final drive. these are driveshaft bikes. no chains. in the late 80s they went from one pivot at the swingarm to dual pivots. one added at the final drive. these don't move very much and tend to eat up the bearings. some people think bmw motorcycles are really hard to work on and expensive. actually most parts are very reasonable and things cross over to most automotive parts. these bearings are not one of those parts. only made by FAG they're expensive and you need two.

so a company has made a bronze bushing kit with steel pins. they provide moly grease but from online searches I've read that moly isn't good with bronze.

I'd appreciate some insight so I can avoid another issue when installing these.



View attachment 57437

View attachment 57436
Are the FAG bearings a special one purpose design? Otherwise, perhaps interchange bearings are available
 
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