NEW 192 pod tomorrow...

Well here's one guys Lippert Super Lube horror story

Super Lube Disaster

I've not had that happen myself but back when I was young and foolish I did get over exuberant about packing some bearings and decided it was a good idea to pack the hubs too. Dumb idea. The seals blew out, ruined my brakes, and that was without any forced pressure on them from a grease gun.

The other fishy thing to me is why Lippert would offer the Super Lube system but not extend the maintenance interval for pulling the drums, which remains at once per year. So if you need to do that anyway why bother with the zerks?

Anyhow, everyone has their own way of doing things, which is fine. In my case I really want to take a close look at those brakes and lubricate them frequently, which are safety critical and have been problematic for me so I just don't trust them to go a couple of years without attention. So I'm pulling the drums off anyway. Once I do that it only adds a few minutes to pop off the seals, press some new grease in the bearings, and reinstall.

My problem was with a standard car axle long ago, and there was no zerk, I just put too much grease in when I packed it. So you can blow seals with too much grease even without a zerk to apply pressure. Since then I pack the bearings only, with only a little grease smeared on the spindles to prevent corrosion. That works fine and I never had a dry bearing so the point is that more isnt always better.

Coincidentally I was doing the annual on my airplane a couple weeks ago and my A&P mechanic who is overseeing my work came over while I was repacking my landing gear bearings and told me to be sure not to pack too much grease in there or I'd get grease on my brake discs.

Whether that article is a good example/statement or not is a glass half full/half empty kind of debate. The bottom line is the guy who wrote it will never use the super lube system again, so he certainly thinks it's relevant. As do I.


We all make decisions based on our experiences. So if you have had good luck with the zerks and feel comfortable enough with your brakes to skip the annual brake inspection and that's fine with me. I've had bad experiences with both grease seals and trailer brakes and choose to do what I do. It only takes me maybe an hour to do both wheels so it's really not a big deal.