I took my P-19 Baja trailer to a tire shop to have the bearings repacked,
replaced, whatever. The mechanic took the tire off, saw a inverse rim
around where the bearing has worn (probably over 4-5 years)which now allows
grease to squirt out the back of the rear seal, he figured it was beyond
his scope and put it all back together.
This is one of the joys of buying a used rig I guess, comes with the real
estate. Anyway, noticing that my trailer has Bearing Buddies, he said it
was not unusual for this to occur, and that 'Bearing Buddies' were
frequently the problem. OK
Then I take the rig to a trailer repair shop, they say the same thing,
"bearing Buddies' create a lot of reapir problems. They say, in theory,
they are great, but in reality, the repair shops make money on them. They
feel that good intentioned sailers over maintain there bearings because
it's easy maintenance, squirt a little grease. That's interesting, I can
see that.
My mechanic explains that these bearing buddies are a theoretical cure for
overanxious power boaters who can't wait for their bearings to cool down.
But with a sail boat and set up time required (real, not IM time), we have
no need for such an item. Either way, he won't put them back on, he will
only put dust caps back on.
Also, as a side note.....once he takes the hub off, if the ridge on the
spindle isn't to bad, he can put a very thin stainless steel sleeve over
the spindle rather than replace the complete axle saving me mucho bucks.
Sounds cool.
At any rate....opinions?
Later