Trailer bearing seals....

[TOMMY RICH]

Well I finally got around to changing my bearing seals on my 02' rig because I noticed over the summer it was slingin' some grease.

After I pulled the wheels off, I noticed that this setup has an o-ring on the backside. I replaced them with a cross referenced number from a local Marina and they looked identical but. after I put everything back together the o-ring is at least a 1/16" away from the seal.

Even if it were designed that way, there is no way that would create a positive seal after a little wear.

My last Tracker didn't have o-rings..anybody else run into this?:huh:

 

[Lamar Gilbert]

My '02 didn't have O-rings in it. Guess you're just the lucky one!

 

[Carl S]

Tee, I replaced my seals last year on my '99 185 trailer. It also had the o-rings on the spindle. There was a post on here sometime back about this issue. The o-ring kinda works like a "backer" and it needs to be on there or the seal will not work properly. That is the first time I have ever seen an o-ring behind an axle seal.

If you search this site you may find the post that explained that these seals are necessary for the axle lip seals to seal properly. I questioned the purposes of these seals myself, but if I rememeber correctly the only way the person who created the post got his seals to work was to put the o-rings back on or replaced them. Hope this helps - Carl

 

[TOMMY RICH]

The posistion of the o-ring would have to be exact to make it seal....and there's no way they could locate the exact depth of where the seal needs to be in realation to the o-ring.

I'll call the dealer tonite.....

 

[Carl S]

My swag is, the purpose of the o-rings are to keep the lip seal from "blowing-out" or separating to much from the spindle if the hubs are over greased. Thus the lip seal comes in contact with the o-ring restricting movement. Or maybe they are there to reduce the amount of crud that can build up around the seal. I hope you get a solid answer from the dealer, it has my curiosity!