Grease on the ball?

dodge guy wrote:
Yes, when maintained properly grease does not ruin a ball/coupler from dirt. On my long trips of 1-3000 miles I have never had any grit in the grease. And of course a farm implement store will tell you no grease, they operate in dirty/dusty environments. Not too mention that the majority of those hitches are pintle hooks!

I have the same ball for 13 years and it shows no signs of galling. My buddies hitch OTOH he never lubes it and it shows! The ball has gouges in it, and we have had to retorque a few times already! He just refuses to put on some grease because it is just one more step. I don't think he even carries any type of grease with him even for wheel bearings!

No pintle hooks on farms that I live and work on around here. In fact, I've only seen one of them in 50 years.

Either a regular bumper hitch ball or a 5th wheel goose neck is waht we have. No grease on them.

But, I am beginning to believe that this ball wear problem is related to the Weight Distribution Hitch device. It puts more force on the ball. Grease may be needed in these cases. Nothing on the farm has one of those.

Ball and ends of lift below it but not on the trailer ends. They brake your sway.

Yes, when maintained properly grease does not ruin a ball/coupler from dirt. On my long trips of 1-3000 miles I have never had any grit in the grease. And of course a farm implement store will tell you no grease, they operate in dirty/dusty environments. Not too mention that the majority of those hitches are pintle hooks!

I have the same ball for 13 years and it shows no signs of galling. My buddies hitch OTOH he never lubes it and it shows! The ball has gouges in it, and we have had to retorque a few times already! He just refuses to put on some grease because it is just one more step. I don't think he even carries any type of grease with him even for wheel bearings!

After we bought our first TT, I read lots of arguments both ways.
I even stopped in a trailer store (implement trailer, not travel trailer) and asked what type of grease I should use.
They told me not to use grease.
I have used axle grease on mine for 5 years.
You need to be diligent about cleaning the ball AND the trailer coupler frequently.
The grease can and will hold grit and cause wear from the grit.
I clean mine every other trip or so, depending on how much driving I do with the hitch in the receiver and how far apart the trips are.

wrenchbender wrote:
I grease my ball and to keep from wearing the grease when not connected I attach a grocery bag and cover the ball.

I cut down one of the bags that every RV park gives out to clean up after dogs. Cut it to about 4-5 inches in length, slip it over the ball, secure it with a long wire tie.

I have some pics of the inside of my coupler and you can see the wear, I just keep an eye on it. My old ball was basically frozen in the hitch body and wasn't moving anymore, I think a little bit of the sleeve squeezing out is normal but mine was excessive. The new sleeve looks like its a little different material and is black instead of red so I don't know if they change them or not.

I just don't understand people complaining about getting grease from the ball on there clothes? Wipe the darn ball off after you unhook and the problem is solved. If one paper towel won't wide off the grease then you are using way to much grease on the ball. After you wipe off the ball take a swipe around the coupler to get any grease that may be on the edge. It's really that simple. I put a rubber cover over the ball, a pic was posted a few posts back, just to keep the road grit off the ball when driving around the dirt roads so I don't have to clean the ball before hooking up. Most the time I take the hitch out of the truck anyway.

I grease my ball and to keep from wearing the grease when not connected I attach a grocery bag and cover the ball.

Muddydogs wrote:

If I had to do it over again and knowing what I know now I would have never went with the Anderson hitch

That ball wear is probably where the latch contacts the ball. I would never trust this design because of the force placed on the latch, when it fails you are in big trouble.

Everyone looks at ball wear because it is readily apparent, but the coupler might be much worse. With a hard chrome plating on the ball it might appear nothing is wrong, but the mild steel coupler may be wearing rapidly. Just grease the ball, common sense should tell you that metal to metal joints need lubrication.

I have found that white lithium grease is much worse than wheel bearing grease.

From what I have read the red stuff coming out is normal on a Anderson Hitch.

Here's a couple pic's of my first Anderson ball with less then 2 thousand miles on it with no grease. Notice the wear on the ball and the red sleeve deal squeezing out. Anderson did send me a new ball assembly and sleeve but after 500 miles of no grease it started to wear just like the first so I know put a little grease on it.







If I had to do it over again and knowing what I know now I would have never went with the Anderson hitch but my pickup handles the trailer just fine and since I have never had a problem towing without a weight distribution hitch when I have done it in the past I figure I'm not going to spend the cash to upgrade hitches at this point. The Anderson dose move some weight and helps with sway some what so I guess its better then nothing plus it sure is light.