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Yeah I ran a mower for probably 100hrs with noisy spindles before I realized my earplugs were in good and it still was hurting my ears lol
Mower decks- sealed or serviceable spindles?
- Thread starter Vern_in_IL
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You can buy the sealed bearings and replace them your self for a fraction of the cost for a new spindle. Just buy several bearings at once to save on shipping.
You will need access to a bearing puller and press.
Also just prying of the covers once a year and adding 2 drops of gear oil to each bearing can easily double the life.
You will need access to a bearing puller and press.
Also just prying of the covers once a year and adding 2 drops of gear oil to each bearing can easily double the life.
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Why not just add more grease?
My old JD said no more than 10 pumps at a time for the spindle. New one says 2.
You can pretty easily blow any seal I would think with a grease gun. When I went to ~15 pumps on the old one it started coming out the top. Had a side mounted zerk.
New one fills from the top and about 20 pumps it starts coming out the bottom. No resistance felt from any seal. So at 2 pumps a couple times a year, it would take 5 years to fill the spindle cavity under normal maintenance procedures?
You can pretty easily blow any seal I would think with a grease gun. When I went to ~15 pumps on the old one it started coming out the top. Had a side mounted zerk.
New one fills from the top and about 20 pumps it starts coming out the bottom. No resistance felt from any seal. So at 2 pumps a couple times a year, it would take 5 years to fill the spindle cavity under normal maintenance procedures?
Don't know what kind of grease was originally used so just add oil.
Mix the wrong greases and get black sludge.
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Typically it's just red wheel bearing/chassis grease I would think
A lot of chassis grease is often calcium based.
Most wheel bearing greases are lithium and lithium complex, I have mixed lithium and lithium complex and nothing bad appeared to happen.
Electric motors seem to favor poly urea. So as long as you know bearings aren't intended for use on electric motor and generators they ought to not be poly urea.
When I have popped open new bearings I have seen red, blue, black, tan and clear greases.
Another two tools in a guys arsenal to have his hubs last longer besides his greasing them carefully with the correct grease is first,if they sling grease,grass clippings build up,clean off.The 2nd tool is a digital temperature meter easily purchased at NAPA.With that you can check temps and quickly check a bearing problem or possibly a very tight belt issue.Normally a hub bearing gives you very little problems,but unfortunately when they do,oh my!.I have a new Kubota T-2290 and it has sealed bearings,they run about 110°,Very happy and believe they are working well.If for instance that temp jumps drastically, I can be a step ahead of possible costly issues
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Timken Sealed Bearings FWIW I prefer sealed bearings over having to grease them. If you ever wear out your bearings and have to replace, use quality parts. At our trucking company, we had issues with U-Joints which had the fittings on them, even though we would grease regularly (on a dry bulk blower PTO shaft). Once we switched over to the sealed ones w/o fittings, the failures stopped.
Because most spindle bearings are sealed units. The zerk makes you feel good because you greased it.
FWIW I removed the inner seals on my upper and lower bearings so that adding grease actually does something.
Just my $0.02
I've had both, and as someone said above, it depends on the quality. My feeling is that quality sealed bearings will last longer. My mower is a JD 425, that is 23 years old and still using the original greaseable spindles. BUT, to buy new ones are $400+ apiece!!!! So, I abought a bunch off ebay, and haven't used one yet, so maybe it's the quality of the spindle, not greaseable or not.
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