hub seals

ive done the hubs seals on my defender twice in the past 2 months, yes they are the right seals and the breather isnt blocked but they just seem to keep going and leaking oil after obout 2-3 weeks of driving any advice what it could be?

inner seals ?,wheel bearings adjusted properly (no free play ) seal race on stub axle okay ? which seal fitted ,ftc4785 isnt an oil seal (it has no garter spring) its a grease seal so wont necessarily hold oil , oil is supposed to be stopped entering wheel beasrings by outer hub seal or seal in stub axle , rtc3511 is an inner oil seal

Hah ... this week-end just gone, I just had to re-do one of mine which was leaking badly due to badly over-tightening the bearings (they were gubbed too,) but as I was putting it all together, I noticed my stub axle is a bit rough which may have contributed to the failure (it was a year old), but the main reason it failed IMHO was the fact that I had put the seal in only FLUSH with the outside edge of the hub instead of inserting it in to 4mm depth (basically as far as they will go) as advised on the actual seal itself.

ah that might be the problem as i have only been sitting them flush with the hub, i wondered why the bearing was able to move about alot i just presumed thats how it was meant to be. so the seal needs to be pushed in as far as possible so the bearing cannot move?

defenderlee said:

ah that might be the problem as i have only been sitting them flush with the hub, i wondered why the bearing was able to move about alot i just presumed thats how it was meant to be. so the seal needs to be pushed in as far as possible so the bearing cannot move?

Click to expand...

Bearing inner race will be pretty free to move until the nut is tightened up. But yes, if you read the print on the actual seal it should say insert to 4mm. By putting it only flush the new seal will be running on a rough bit of the stub axle and this will wear it out in no time, but if you look closely at your stub axle you should see where the seal used to run as it will be all nice and polished.

My problem is, I have replaced two sets of bearing in the previous two week-ends and I only put them flush too, it was this week-end that I realised my mistake, therefore, I'll probably suffer the same on the other two wheels in the very near future.

unlucky but atleast you now know the problem and i appreciate the advice, i never thought that reading the instructions would actually help haha but thanks again

If it is the solution to your problem, you are very welcome.