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Drive shaft lube - too much grease, whoops.

17K views 16 replies 13 participants last post by  norm356 
#1 · (Edited)
Yesterday I did my own 15000 maintenance. Well I was greasing the rear slip yoke on the rear drive shaft and I expected to see old grease come out of the fitting (like on my old truck). I didn't realize I only needed to put a couple of pumps of grease in there and probably put about 25 pumps or more before I stopped. I've since read here that too much grease in the drive shaft slip joint will impede its movement and eventually cause damage because the slip joint becomes hydro locked.

So my question is what’s the easiest way to get the extra grease out? Should I just remove the transfer case end of the rear drive shaft and slide the slip joint apart and dig out the excess grease? Does the slip joint come out easily?


I tried removing the zerk fitting and compressing the slip joint by driving over some parking lot speed bumps etc. but very little grease came out that way :)
 
#3 ·
I've never done this, so if I am wrong, somebody correct me.

I think you need to removed the drive shaft from the propeller shaft, there are 4 bolts. Then slide the drive shaft out, clean up the mess, reassemble. Torque the 4 propeller shaft bolts to 65 lbs/ft. Put 3 or 4 pumps of grease in there.
 
#4 ·
Yeah, that's what I was thinking I was going to try tonight. Before I started I was kind of wondering how hard it was going to be to slip the drive shaft and propeller shaft apart or if they literally just slip apart and back together (there's plenty of grease in there now, haha). Geeze, I feel like a moron.
 
#6 ·
It comes right apart. Just mark the yoke and the splined shaft so that you install it in the exact same orientation to each other. No sense in taking a chance on a vibration. You only want a thin layer of grease to cover all the splines so it doesn't bind, that's all. A teflon based grease is the best for this but it isn't often carried by local parts stores. GM has a teflon spec'd grease for their slip yokes.

If there's a way that you can exert enough pressure on the driveshaft to compress the slip yoke coupling slowly, it should squeeze all the excess grease out thru the splines. But, with as much grease as you pumped in, that might be very difficult to do.

As a rule of thumb, whenever your greasing zerks on a regular basis, they shouldn't take more than 2-4 pumps.

DEWFPO
 
#7 ·
Make sure to mark everything with a white pen or something that you can see clearly. Putting it back togather is importat because of balance. I would call a drive shaft place just to be shure of what you are doing.
 
#8 ·
Done! :bigthumb:

Thanks for the help everyone.

I removed the 4 nuts holding the drive shaft to the t-case output. I was able to compress the slip yoke about .5 inches not enough to remove it from the bolts so I removed the zerk fitting and that gave the grease someplace to go. I compressed the slip yoke all the way by hand and it squeezed all my grease and then some out of the zerk fitting hole. I didn't have to seperate anything. Put it all back together (properly torqued) gave one squirt of grease and am calling it good. thanks again.
 
#9 ·
Done!

Thanks for the help everyone.

I removed the 4 nuts holding the drive shaft to the t-case output. I was able to compress the slip yoke about .5 inches not enough to remove it from the bolts so I removed the zerk fitting and that gave the grease someplace to go. I compressed the slip yoke all the way by hand and it squeezed all my grease and then some out of the zerk fitting hole. I didn't have to seperate anything. Put it all back together (properly torqued) gave one squirt of grease and am calling it good. thanks again.
Thanks for sharing all that. Good stuff to know.
 
#10 ·
looks like this thread has been dead for a decade but hoping I can still looks like this thread has been dead for a decade but hoping I can still get some help.
I recently I recently bought an FJ second hand and am looking to grease the slip yoke. I see everybody says to only use three to four pumps however I recently raised the FJ which seems like it causes slip yoke to be slightly further out allowing more room for grease.
Between the suspension lift and it looking like the former owner never greasing, should I do more than the standardhree to four? Perhaps 6 to 8?
 
#13 ·
I have a 3" lift on my 08 FJ.
I just pumped (a week ago) about 25 - 30 pumps of grease into the rear driveshaft slip yoke. On the last 10 - 15 pumps the Driveshaft Slip Yoke began move toward the rear of the vehicle with each pump. I think it moved about 1/4" total with the 25 - 30 total pumps of grease.
I have not noticed any abnormal driving issues afterwards.
I did this same thing about a year ago/15,000 miles ago, never any driving issues after that driveline slip yoke service either.

So… what IS the preferred method of servicing the driveline slip yoke with grease?

Pump grease until the slip yoke begins to move and then stop?
 
#15 ·
So… what IS the preferred method of servicing the driveline slip yoke with grease?

Pump grease until the slip yoke begins to move and then stop?
That is my preferred method, and the one I've used since buying my FJC new. 142k miles on it now, slip yoke lubed every 5k miles with an oil change and absolutely no problems.

Here is Spicer's lubrication procedure. Scroll down to the "Spicer 10 series slip assemblies lubrication procedure" section. They say to apply grease until it comes out of the seal.

Spicer Driveshaft Lube & Torque Specification
 
#14 ·
I always pump in 6 to 10 pumps. Never a problem. I have read of guys putting an entire tube at one shot without a problem. I feel Toyota left these things with only minimal grease. :)
 
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