Preferred U-Joints

[LorenS]

When you fellows replace u-joints, do you have a preferred brand and series? And most importantly, on the front axles do you use greasable joints? I believe the Spicer SPL55-4X has the zerk, but how hard would access be?

 

For my rear driveshaft am leaning toward Spicer 5-1410-1X, the greasable model.

Do you all change the center bearing at the same time? Mine seems to be in good shape.

 

All [good] advice would be appreciated!

[Stanley]

I have always had mixed answers from guys, about 50/50 from sealed to zerk. I have always ran zerk ones (previously) but figure I'll try out the sealed ones next (now) lol. Where I work at (John Deere-yellow) that's all they have is sealed units. As far as brand, I dont really have specifics ive ran but I try and keep the spicers spinning 

 

Alot of help ain't I...

[Mopar1973Man]

Grease-able u-joints only here. I rather take the time and shot the u-joint with grease every oil change and push out the old grease, water, and salts, etc then replace with fresh grease. Sealed u-joint for me typically end a short life being there is no way to push fresh grease unless you press then all back out. Too much of PITA to do. 

Edited January 22, 2019 by Mopar1973Man

[LorenS]

Alrighty, if you guys can grease front axle joints then so can I!  Since mine are currently the sealed variety, I've never tried to get a grease gun in there.

I was reading last night in the Spicer catalog that the sealed variety are not shipped with sufficient grease for use, only for storage, and they are to be packed before installation.  Seems weird, but I would hope their reasoning is something like the grease may go all over hell in the package, not that they're trying to save a few cents worth of grease cost.

[Mopar1973Man]

Not a fan of Spicer. Typically NAPA but most failure I've had was being lazy and not greasing all the joints. Like my front driveshaft is a PITA. Now front axle joints are breeze it grease up.

[LorenS]

NAPA has a couple of different model numbers that have "NAPA" in the name; one is the Proformer line made by who-knows-who, the other also says "NAPA", then is followed by SKF.
 

Spicer has everthing from econo-line joints at $8 apiece, to the $28 apiece models I'd likely buy, to the "extreme" models at $100 apiece - I will not be using those!  Prices from Rockauto, "extreme" price from somewhere else.

I'll likely pick up the SKF NAPAs since I need to get a few things from there after work.  Easier returns if I happen to screw up!

[AH64ID]

I run sealed u-joints for a couple reasons. 

 

First being that they are stronger, for the same size. Second is that they have a better seal to keep road grime out of them. 

 

I don't really care about the maintenance aspect of them, but with greaseable u-joints you have to be very proactive in maintenance on them since the seals are weaker. The new grease is used to push the old grease/contaminates out. 

 

I have AAM 1550 series u-joints in my truck now. The local driveline shop has had the best luck with AAM sealed u-joints. 

 

My 4Runner is going on 190K miles with the original greasable u-joints, but it gets greased every 5K miles and rarely gets used on dirt and doesn't tow. 

 

 

Edited January 22, 2019 by AH64ID

[LorenS]

I'm pretty gentle on my machinery, so breaking a u-joint is something I've not experienced thus far. However, I've had a lot "sealed" u-joints installed by others that have gone dry during normal use.  I also tend to over-lube rather than under.  My K5 Blazer and this truck are so easy to climb under that they get grease on a very irregular but frequent basis.  Same goes for my tractors and mowers.

 

In instances where preventive maintenance access is difficult, I do like a quality sealed bearing.

[Stanley]

1 hour ago, AH64ID said:

I run sealed u-joints for a couple reasons. 

 

First being that they are stronger, for the same size. Second is that they have a better seal to keep road grime out of them. 

 

I don't really care about the maintenance aspect of them, but with greaseable u-joints you have to be very proactive in maintenance on them since the seals are weaker. The new grease is used to push the old grease/contaminates out. 

 

I guess this is kind of my reasoning as well...Well put @AH64ID

[Rotax3006]

I have a lot of the sealed factory joints in my truck still.  They have 252000 on them.  On the ranch we use Spicer joints with grease fittings.  They seem to last a little longer if you grease them often.  These operate exclusively in the dirt and mud, on highway I would use sealed units. 

 

[Mopar1973Man]

That wild I lost my first set of u-joints in 20k miles. Dried out no way to live them. Had driveshaft shop install a carrier bearing he spotted an worn u-joint. He replaced it with Spicer sealed. If failed pretty quick like 30k miles.

 

Grease-able tend to last a good period of time as long as I push out some of the black grease. 366k and rolling...

 

Napa joints in my front shaft are over 100k now. Rear shaft is close but not quite.

[Macarena Man]

10 hours ago, Mopar1973Man said:

Grease-able u-joints only here. I rather take the time and shot the u-joint with grease every oil change and push out the old grease, water, and salts, etc then replace with fresh grease. Sealed u-joint for me typically end a short life being there is no way to push fresh grease unless you press then all back out. Too much of PITA to do. 

The grease only goes to the quadrant with the least resistance . . .  leaving the other three dry.

Have always got better service from a quality sealed unit.

Other folks have other experiences . . . 

[Stanley]

2 minutes ago, Macarena Man said:

The grease only goes to the quadrant with the least resistance . . .  leaving the other three dry.

Have always got better service from a quality sealed unit.

Other folks have other experiences . . . 

This is also a valid point to the convocation. I see this with jd joints and especially pins and bushings in equipment. Obviously their in alot harsher environment but same principle I would think...

[AH64ID]

Only 45K miles on my 1550's, but zero issues. 

 

My front u-joints have 140K on them, but they don't spin full time since 86K miles. 

 

My OE rear u-joints were still perfect when removed at 96K miles. They were removed because the carrier bearing was shot and I went to a 1 piece drive shaft. 

 

My truck doesn't lead an easy life. Lots of towing miles, lots of very dusty miles, and very little empty highway miles. Last year 49.5% of my miles were towing, and for the year I only averaged 12.82 mpg. 

 

I ran NAPA u-joints in a old beater toyota... won't touch those again. That was back when I thought NAPA sold decent parts. 

 

Dad's 06 got over 100K out of the OEM sealed, and he went with greasable. IIRC he's had to have them replaced already and they didn't have 50K miles on them but did have regular servicing. 

 

 

56 minutes ago, Mopar1973Man said:

That wild I lost my first set of u-joints in 20k miles. Dried out no way to live them. Had driveshaft shop install a carrier bearing he spotted an worn u-joint. He replaced it with Spicer sealed. If failed pretty quick like 30k miles.

 

Grease-able tend to last a good period of time as long as I push out some of the black grease. 366k and rolling...

 

Napa joints in my front shaft are over 100k now. Rear shaft is close but not quite.

 

Do they have 100K miles on them or 366K miles? 

. 

[dripley]

My front joints gave up around 325k. My drive shaft joints and carrier bearing are still in tbe truck at 460k. All of them sealed. The truck had all sealed joints,front end and drive line. I will always use sealed as long as I can find them and they appear to be quality. Just not sure how you can tell that for sure.

 I did find 3 new old stock u joints for the drive shaft but have not found a carrier bearing like that or I would have bought that too. Even the front lasted about 240k. Even the MOOG front end parts are mstill holding at 220k. They are not sealed by the way. But they were purchased before Federal Mogul bought them out.

[Guest 04Mach1]

11 hours ago, Mopar1973Man said:

Not a fan of Spicer. Typically NAPA but most failure I've had was being lazy and not greasing all the joints. Like my front driveshaft is a PITA. Now front axle joints are breeze it grease up.

Just an FYI... pretty much all Napa branded u-joints are manufactured by SKF which is a premium OEM supplier. SKF is top quality. I have also seen a few Napa u-joints manufactured by Precision which I'm not sure who their parent company is. I noticed most of Napa's "Traction" line of u-joints are manufactured by Precision. When you get into heavy duty class 7 and 8 u-joints I have taken notice that Napa just re-boxes the OEM whether it's Spicer, Meritor, etc. 

 

Napa does not manufacture anything that they sell. It's all just re-boxed in Napa boxes and sold at a premium price. I will say that MOST but not all parts sold at Napa are of higher quality than say O'Reilly's or AutoZone.

 

I like Napa because most are independently owned so most of the time you are supporting a small mom and pop shop instead of a greedy corporation. In essence Napa is like McDonald's, alot of franchisee's and very few corporate owned stores.

[dripley]

3 minutes ago, 04Mach1 said:

Just an FYI... pretty much all Napa branded u-joints are manufactured by SKF which is a premium OEM supplier. SKF is top quality.

I have to ask this and not knocking what you know but I did buy a SKF carrier bearing and it is made in China. I am not saying every thing from China is junk and this one is going on the truck soon. Just curious if you know  where the bearings you speak of come from. I just dont know anymore.

[Guest 04Mach1]

2 minutes ago, dripley said:

I have to ask this and not knocking what you know but I did buy a SKF carrier bearing and it is made in China. I am not saying every thing from China is junk and this one is going on the truck soon. Just curious if you know  where the bearings you speak of come from. I just dont know anymore.

I've noticed that alot of US manufacturers have moved manufacturing to Asia and South America. My bet is they did it because labor cost less, taxes are less, and laws are probably more relaxed as far as air and water pollutants. I haven't noticed a lack of quality with Chinese SKF yet... Even Cummins, Cat, and Detroit makes most of their parts in places other than North America these days.

[dripley]

21 minutes ago, 04Mach1 said:

I've noticed that alot of US manufacturers have moved manufacturing to Asia and South America. My bet is they did it because labor cost less, taxes are less, and laws are probably more relaxed as far as air and water pollutants. I haven't noticed a lack of quality with Chinese SKF yet... Even Cummins, Cat, and Detroit makes most of their parts in places other than North America these days.

I remember growing up when made in japan was the cheap stuff. Times do change and China has made improvements. And as I said the chinese SKF will be going on the truck soon,

[Bacon Creek Metal]

I run the Sealed Dana Spicers in all of my rigs.  My Bride's dually had 250,000 miles on it before it needed ujoints anywhere.  I figured that was impressive considering how hard we push that truck.  When I tore them apart to replace them they were still tight with maybe one dry cap per joint.  I never got that kind of mileage out of greasable joints.  Maybe 50,000 tops.  I used to grease my rigs every oil change and crawl around them checking them over.  I simply don't have the time to now.

 

I have since swapped my Fummins over to the Sealed Dana Spicer 1410s, all 6 of the driveshaft joints and the front axle joints.