Add grease zerk to axle or not?

I usually end up servicing my bearings when I do a brake inspection. If you have it apart anyway, it makes sense to repack, or at least inspect the bearings and put a new seal in anyways. If I buy a used trailer, the brakes and bearings WILL get checked. As stated above I have owned trailers that have never had a brake inspection or bearings repacked in close to two decades. The bearings are oil bearings and I can see the level of the oil, and the heavy duty trailer doesn't have enough miles to warrant taking it down for a brake inspection.

True enough, and mostly my point here in the wonderland of stupidity, PA. They must pull two wheels every year at inspection. In my opinion, this does nothing but invite trouble where none existed previously. It would be nice if they could use a system of braking where the brakes could be checked without messing with my bearing preload and increasing the possibility of dirt entering the bearing.

JJBIRISH wrote:

scottykrug wrote:
Just finished repacking all the hubs and noticed that there was a threaded hole at the end of the spindle and a small hole just inside the lip for the inner seal. I presume this is one of those easy lube fixtures (my axles just didn't come fully set up with that option). I will still pull them apart to service them, but is there any benefit to add the zerk to add grease? I removed the craptastic plastic grease caps (two cracked and one let water in) and replaced them with oversized old school metal ones so there will be plenty of room inside the cap. I am thinking against it, but would like to see if there is any benefit from those who have this feature.

The answer to your question is, it depends… if you are going to do annual pull apart service anyway, they would be of little benefit to you… if you do add the fitting you need to make sure the drum has the right double lip seal installed in it…

If you are not good at following a regular maintenance schedule or choose to use more extended maintenance schedules, as many do, they can be a great benefit to you…
Like most things there is a proper procedure to follow to reduce risk… not following the procedure will raise the risk more than doing nothing…

A little about risk, they come in many forms… when it comes to axle bearing failure it is often mentioned that the bearings were recently serviced, either by the owner or a service center…
I have known of people that have reused old seals that looked good yet, and I have known of a few times that new seals have been damaged during their installation or reassembly and times they have been adjusted incorrectly… all have their own risk…

There are some risk from not servicing and some risk of servicing… one of the biggest risk today is poor quality bearings and seals mostly imported that are being sold…
Another thing to remember, there are many axles that go un-serviced for a very long time and never have a bearing failure… many autos reach the junkyard with OE bearings still in them, never serviced and trailer axles used on multiple trailers never serviced…
One more thing, you never know what someone else did, and I would prefer using my EZ lube feature to letting someone I don’t know service my brakes and axles any time… and yes that is a real benefit to having them…

This should be a sticky. :)

You hit on every one of my points I have tried to make for years.

Most people don't understand that the parts you get from Kragen or where ever are usually NOT the same quality as OEM. And sometimes not even close. Even some newer OEM parts are junk.

I have an old trailer with made in the USA Timkin bearings in it. I check about once every 7 years or so. Only packed them once in the 27 year life of the trailer. Even then it didn't really need it.

My point is, I think a lot of times people cause more problems then they solve.

The old bearings work fine if you just service them every once in a while. When you get to heavy duty axles, around 8,000#, most manufacturers go to oil bearings anyway.

brulaz wrote:

JJBIRISH wrote:

...
Another thing to remember, there are many axles that go un-serviced for a very long time and never have a bearing failure… many autos reach the junkyard with OE bearings still in them, never serviced
...

Yes, but all modern autos use sealed bearings that you never have to service. They exist for trailers, I see Dexter makes axles with sealed bearings, but I've never seen a trailer using them.

Another pet peeve of mine, along with the general lack of self-adjusting brakes. Our trailers are just dinosaurs.

Yes the modern autos are using double sealed bearings or sealed bearing cartridges, but I am referring to the standard old bearing sets, where the only time they were serviced is when they went bad often after many years… once the removable disk brake rotor was incorporated and the hub no longer was pulled to do a brake job, many if not most of these went from new to graveyard without a bearing failure or bearing service…
the same with the rear bearings, many went from new to graveyard without so much as a rear end oil change…
I am not sure the new never lube used In autos will work as well… I already know of to many that were noisy and had to be replaced…

I have extensively used (permanently sealed) double sealed bearings as replacements to the standard bearings in my off road cross country race bikes… they worked great for running in extreme wet and muddy conditions…

As much as I like the never lube bearings, I don’t care for the cartridge type used in RV axles… I believe the bearings sit to close and don’t hold up well enough to the side load stress placed on them…

IF the zerks are missing install them to keep the water out.Close up the hole. If you use them its your choice. Moderation is the name of the game.

JJBIRISH wrote:

...
Another thing to remember, there are many axles that go un-serviced for a very long time and never have a bearing failure… many autos reach the junkyard with OE bearings still in them, never serviced
...

Yes, but all modern autos use sealed bearings that you never have to service. They exist for trailers, I see Dexter makes axles with sealed bearings, but I've never seen a trailer using them.

Another pet peeve of mine, along with the general lack of self-adjusting brakes. Our trailers are just dinosaurs.

x2 Don't mess with the zerk. Not needed.

scottykrug wrote:
Just finished repacking all the hubs and noticed that there was a threaded hole at the end of the spindle and a small hole just inside the lip for the inner seal. I presume this is one of those easy lube fixtures (my axles just didn't come fully set up with that option). I will still pull them apart to service them, but is there any benefit to add the zerk to add grease? I removed the craptastic plastic grease caps (two cracked and one let water in) and replaced them with oversized old school metal ones so there will be plenty of room inside the cap. I am thinking against it, but would like to see if there is any benefit from those who have this feature.

The answer to your question is, it depends… if you are going to do annual pull apart service anyway, they would be of little benefit to you… if you do add the fitting you need to make sure the drum has the right double lip seal installed in it…

If you are not good at following a regular maintenance schedule or choose to use more extended maintenance schedules, as many do, they can be a great benefit to you…
Like most things there is a proper procedure to follow to reduce risk… not following the procedure will raise the risk more than doing nothing…

A little about risk, they come in many forms… when it comes to axle bearing failure it is often mentioned that the bearings were recently serviced, either by the owner or a service center…
I have known of people that have reused old seals that looked good yet, and I have known of a few times that new seals have been damaged during their installation or reassembly and times they have been adjusted incorrectly… all have their own risk…

There are some risk from not servicing and some risk of servicing… one of the biggest risk today is poor quality bearings and seals mostly imported that are being sold…
Another thing to remember, there are many axles that go un-serviced for a very long time and never have a bearing failure… many autos reach the junkyard with OE bearings still in them, never serviced and trailer axles used on multiple trailers never serviced…
One more thing, you never know what someone else did, and I would prefer using my EZ lube feature to letting someone I don’t know service my brakes and axles any time… and yes that is a real benefit to having them…

Fair enough- I presumed moderation is the key. My failed bearing may have had two causes. The inner seal was broken.... grease was all over the backing plate and innards of the brake system. The main culprit though (found water mixed grease on the tip of the spindle) was the cheapo plastic grease caps. Two were cracked severely and the two uncracked ones removed (too) easily with just two fingers. I presume they are where the water got in but it is no longer an issue as they are history! On a side note, I read somewhere about using a section of pvc pipe to install the caps and boy is that slick!

Thank you again for the reply.