greasing Front ball joint

[Eric Winkworth]

I was wondering how to grease those huge military style ball joint on the front of my cruiser (BJ70) I have a Manual on CD but it doesn't show the location very well, if anyone could take a picture for me I would greatly appricate it. All the bolt heads around mine are under an inch of oil and undercoat, lol

Thanks a bunch for any help
Eric

 

[crushers]

there are 2 ways, one is remove the big square nut just off center top and fill will grease gun...
the other way is to remove the spindle and examine and regrease while reassembly...
cheers

 

[cruiser_guy]

Eric,
If your knuckles are under as much oil/grease as you say, chances are the inner axle seal is leaking and you are due for a knuckle rebuild. If I was you I'd pull off the hub lock and see how things look. If you get a thick oil pouring out then the inner axle seal is definitely gone and you need a rebuild. Figure a day if you're relatively good with a wrench and haven't done the knuckles before.

 

[Eric Winkworth]

lol, no the oil and grease is from me, I got two professional oil undercoats done and now I spray the hole underbeath with my used oil ( I KNOW THAT ISN'T TOO ENVIRMENTALLY FRIENDLY BUT IT WORKS) everywhere all over the under carrage is equaly oily and undercoated. Wish I had a little oil pond I could drive it through, I think the brake pads would absorb it though.

, the balls themselves after I wiped them off look nearly new, still shiny metal. As for greasing them holy crap they seem to take alot I used up a hole tube on the two of them and I think I could have put more in, I will keep an eye on them leaking though.

The inner axle seal you say, ummm does that drain out the diff when that leaks?

Sorry if thats a stupied question

 

[crushers]

what happens when the axle seal leaks is the diff fluid mixes with the grease in the CV joint cavity and the mess turns to water and comes pouring out of the seal, if it gets reall bad then it can also travel up the spindle and contaminate the wheel bearings and then the bearings let go...
cheers

 

[Eric Winkworth]

well thats good because she doesn't loose any diff fliud so it doesn't have anything wrong with it. I wanted to grease it just for maintance not because I saw anything leaking.

Thanks for the info though
Cheers
Eric

 

[crushers]

preventative maintainence... what a novel idea...
i wish more of my customers felt the same way...
cheers

 

[wesintl]

Greasing the knuckle though the square nut is better than nothing but If you haven't been in to repack the Birfield and the bearings you should do so. The birf takes moly grease.

 

[beanz2]

Eric,

The knuckle housing can take a lot of additional grease and indeed the FSM only instructs a partial fill of the housing on rebuild. I agree with wesintl there is little good to be achieved by filling the housing from the square plug as the critical parts, the birfield joints and the knuckle bearings, are better repacked in grease in a fully disassembled fashion.

The plug is located on top toward the front of your housing just below the steering arm on the side closest to the wheel.

Dave

 

[wesintl]

OK Dave, Is that a later knuckle 79+? And I'm guessing you drilled and tapped for the xtra stud? That steering arm looks stout

 

[beanz2]

I wish the knuckle was mine, but it's just a pic I saved on the hard drive It was from a guy who added the 5th stud and used Dana 44 knuckle studs.

Dave

 

[Eric Winkworth]

cool, but I already found it, I am planning on dissaembling it on my holidays this summer, untill then the tube of grease I put in won't hurt.

Thanks for the help
Eric