Monday, February 17, 2014

A quick little chore

Had a little time tonight so I cleaned up my basement workbench. After I got all the tools put mostly away and little bits and bobs cleaned up I finally got around to a little task I've been leaving undone for too long.

Mercedes-Benz requires 60g of axle grease be installed when repacking the front wheel bearings, at least on the old cars I've got. They sell a tube with 150g of grease and you just approximate half the tube for each wheel but the tubes are expensive and there isn't a Mercedes dealer anywhere handy to me. Mobil 1 grease is considered an acceptable substitute but it comes in big tubs. Awhile ago I realized that the little containers duck sauce came in were perfect for holding 60g of axle grease. I bought a little scale on Amazon and made up a couple. I used them both last year and I've been trying to remember to refill ever since.


A mostly empty container on the scale already zero'd out. The containers both weighed 4.4g empty with just a smear of grease inside. Even after I'd used the bulk of the grease on my 190D the remains were super handy for little jobs that needed some lubrication.


60g right on the money. It takes a little fiddling to hit 60 exactly but I'm not super worried if its 59.9 or 60.1.

I've got a plastic spoon that I used to scoop the grease from the tub into the container, I use a little wooden ice cream paddle (like you ate your Hoodsie cup with when I was a kid) to scrape the grease from the spoon into the container. It takes about 3 scoops.


I labeled the lid with what it is "Wheel bearing grease" and how much there is "1 wheel 60g".

With 2 of these on hand I can deal with both front wheels on one car. The 190D in particular seems to be very sensitive and wants its wheel bearings looked after. Both the 190Ds I've had have experienced severe wheel bearing failure. I should probably make repacking the bearings part of yearly maintenance. Its a lot easier to pull 'em apart and repack when the bearing isn't shredded than when it is.

Jetta to the doctor again

After all the excitement with the Jetta a couple weeks ago I hoped we'd be in for some quiet time. Not so. All the monkeying around with the turbo oil line apparently unsettled the three way coolant pipe that lives under it causing a pretty severe coolant leak. This had me paranoid because at first I couldn't figure out where the coolant was going, just that it disappeared. I was super relieved when I realized it was dripping from the three way pipe.

Next big problem, its way too cold and snowy for me to wrestle this one in the driveway so its back to Keith at KMH motors in Lowell which is a solid 45 miles from here. Will we make it? Actually I'm going to stack the deck on this one, I ordered a tow dolly from Uhaul, we'll tow the car to Lowell and have a day out. Angie needs to buy new sneakers so we'll go up to Nashua and shop, then have lunch in our favorite Pho restaurant. Keith says he can replace the 3 way pipe and reseal the IP in one day. The IP leaking is probably what caused the issue in the first place, it drips diesel fuel onto the 3 way pipe which ruins the rubber hose. I'm not entirely sure the IP is leaking now but I want to maximize the shop time, if theres any sign its leaking or might leak in the near future I want it fixed now. In for a penny, in for a pound...