Hi Ric,
With scratches on a bearing seal area, the seal lip is likely getting
chewed up in a real hurry. There is a drain hole that allows the grease
to come out and down the outside of the backing plate.
I would suggest two things.
1. Make sure the vent is open on the axle housing.
2. Get a repair piece for the scratched seal area from nearly any decent
bearing supply house. Lots easier that swapping the whole assembly.
Repair pieces are routinely used on nearly all oil seal areas in industry
and automotive applications.
Paul
PAsgeirsson@juno.com
On Tue, 27 Apr 1999 08:12:50 -0700 Ric Otte <otte@cats.ucsc.edu> writes:
>I've been trying for a long time, unsuccessfully, to stop the oil seal
>on
>the axle from leaking on my MK II sprite. I now have no leaks where
>the
>paper gasket and rubber ring goes (due to silicone), but I get oil
>that
>leaks out and down the back of the brake plate (it doesn't get into
>the
>brakes lately because I put silicone between the brake backing plate
>and
>the mounts). But I'd like to fix this leak, since I don't know how
>long it
>will be before it starts leaking into the brakes again. When I
>replaced
>the rubber oil seal, and noticed that the axle tube has some scratches
>on
>it where the oil seal rubs, and while they aren't real deep, they may
>be
>deep enough to let oil through (I don't know how deep a scratch would
>have
>to be to let oil pass through). I can only think of a few options:
>
>1. get new rear end. How available are they in N. California and how
>much
>would this cost?
>2. I have a rear end from a later sprite. I was wondering if I could
>take
>it and the one on the car to a welder. Have him cut off the mounting
>brackets from both axle tubes, and weld the old ones on the newer axle
>tubes. Then I should be able to simply mount this axle tube onto my
>car.
>Would this really work?
>3. get some fine sandpaper and try to sand down the axle tube where
>the
>oil seal rubs. This might take a while, and I'd have no guarantee of
>ending up with a perfectly round tube for the seal to go on. And then
>the
>narrower tube might not seal as well.
>4. get some epoxy or JB weld and try to fill in the cracks, and then
>sand
>until it is flush with the steel surface. I don't think the cracks
>are
>deep enough for the glue to sink in and stick, but perhaps it would
>work.
>5. get dual bearing hubs or some other upgrade to rear so oil seals
>might
>be some other place on the axle tube. I don't know if this would
>work, and
>it sounds expensive.
>6. get another new oil seal and try again. If it fails, live with
>the oil
>leak and hope it doesn't get into the brakes again.
>
>Anybody have any wisdom or suggestions? Thanks.
>
>Ric Otte
>p.s. I also checked to make sure the breather valve is clear,and it
>is;
>didn't want any pressure pushing oil out.
>
>
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