Speedo OOzing Grease - Hub Temos

[AustHaflinger]

When I replaced my hub gears last October I also had to replace the speedo drive on the front diff to match the new hubs. Now some 6 months later I have noticed some grease on the floor just under the clutch pedal. At first I thought it was coming from the pedal as I have greased it in the past but yesterday I noticed a dob of grease lower down and today when driving a big dob landed on my trouser leg.

Looking closer it is coming from the back of the speedo - it drops down onto some wiring and sits there until gravity or a bump and then drops to the floor. When putting the speedo drive in I filled it full of grease and then topped it up via grease nibble - I guess it has taken 6 months for the turning speedo cable to slowly wind the grease up to the speedo head.

Should this be happening.

Also on the issue of the hubs - someone mentioned of the Portal Hub Forum that the temperature of Pinz hubs should checked after longer trips. I checked my Haffi hubs and the fronts are running about 28 degrees C and the rears 38 degrees C. Since I have had the new hub gears the oil in the fronts has always been clean but the oil in the rears have always been dirty and a bit smelly, I guess indicating the larger rear gears taking longer to run in and the rear wheel drive with more load at the rear while the fronts are just freewheeling. As it is easy to do I am changing hub oil every 1000km at the moment until all is run in. The amount of oil in the hubs is very small so must work hard.

Is anyone else measuring their hub temps and what sort of temps are you getting.

Garry

[heinkeljb]

I lent my digital non contact to a friend so they could find the hot /cold spots on their new house, still haven't got it back so can't help with the hub temperature.

On a connected point, I changed the hub oil on Lurch ready for the Dutch Treffen this weekend and the front two had pressureised as when I took the fill bolt out (always undo the filler before the drain in case you can't open it for one reason or another. That way you still have oil in where it needs to be)!

The oil flowed / bubbled out all FROTHY of the fill hole - NO water, just air mixed in with the oil. Weird... not seen that before. So anyway, have now done the hub oil change. Did the main service last weekend - So ready to go. Just need to load up the camping gear.

John

P.S. I am sure the grease coming out of the top of the speedo cable is a result of the direction the cable turns in and the direction the cable is wound. I am sure it will stop dropping grease on you soon, but in the meantime, you could make a "catch hammock" using some "Gaffer tape" / "Duck Tape" or what ever that sort of fabric tape is called in your part of the world!

[AustHaflinger]

Not had frothy oil - just dirty stinky oil out of the rears.

If I remember correctly when you did the Treffen last time around you ran out of green steam so what have you done to make sure your battery is going to meet your electrical needs. My battery is twice the size of a standard Haffy battery so does take a long time to drain if demand exceeds generator output. It will still turn to engine over if the battery is technically flat but once it is down it does take a long time to charge. I put it on the charger once a month just to be sure but have never seen the voltmeter below 12.5v day or night when the engine is running.

Sounds like you have everything else covered and I am sure all will go well.

Garry

[heinkeljb]

Since last years run out of electrical umph, I have taken apart every electrical connection in the charging / starting circuit, cleaned and reassembled. New dynastart brushes.
I now have a 20-0-20 ammeter and a volt meter installed. I am pretty sure that last years "glitch" was down to 2.5 hours of driving in the rain with main beam on most of the time along with the wipers. Standard lights are 35/35 watt, mine are 38 / 43 watt when you include the overheads of the ballasts. The output of my dynastart does seem to waver a bit depending on engine revs, so I think the commutator has gone oval.

I have a spare dynastart which has been reconditioned which I will take, along with a battery charger! (and a set of jump leads). All my testing since then has pointed to high resistance joints in the system, hence the clean up of all the electrical joints.

If I have similar issue again, I'll fit an alternator, although that will steal some of the few Haflingers in the engine. Hopefully I won't miss those when off road or on road for that matter.

John

[AustHaflinger]

Standard lights are 35/35 watt, mine are 38 / 43 watt when you include the overheads of the ballasts. The output of my dynastart does seem to waver a bit depending on engine revs, so I think the commutator has gone oval.

I have 55/50w Halogens in my headlights but not have any issues as yet but I have not driven the distances you have in one go. Think about also taking a spare fully charged spare battery as well. On long trips in my other vehicle I take my 120w solar panels but then we have sun here When I do long runs in the Haffie I will have them folded out in the tray to provide extra power.

Of course being a generator rather than an alternator the dynastart should change output voltage as revs change - increase with revs but the regulator should even things out. Maybe it is the regulator that is causing the wavering.

I have thought about an alternator where the governor goes but I have not found one that has a physical size that will reasonably fit.

Cheers

Garry

[heinkeljb]

Actually, I forgot to say I have replaced the old mechanical regulator with an electronic version - which although expensive does seem to work really well. When you first start, the charging current shown by the ammeter goes positive to the value of around 5 amps. then after a while it drops down to just positive. If you turn on the main lights with the engine on tick over, the ammeter goes to about 9 amps negative.
If you then increase the revs to the point the electronic regulator thinks it has enough juice, the ammeter flips back to positive side, but only just, like the regulator has decided that it only needs to put out 10 amps in order to even things out again. - So we will see what happens this time!
Good call, I'll take another battery, just so happens we had to replace the one on my son's pickup as it was the wrong one. So we have a good spare battery available.

John

[AustHaflinger]

I am sure the grease coming out of the top of the speedo cable is a result of the direction the cable turns in and the direction the cable is wound. I am sure it will stop dropping grease on you soon, but in the meantime, you could make a "catch hammock" using some "Gaffer tape" / "Duck Tape" or what ever that sort of fabric tape is called in your part of the world!

Well we are now 13 months since I replaced the speedo drive and the speedo is still dumping grease on my feet.

Today after a 20km drive.

It is now getting beyond a joke as I now have grease stains on various shoes and trousers.

When I replaced the drive I put all new O rings in, filled the little gearbox with lithium grease and then topped it up through the grease nibble. When it first started dripping grease I just assumed I had overfilled the little box and as the speedo cable turned it was just pumping the excess out up the cable into the speedo where it dripped out. However if that was the case, it would have stopped ages ago.

That crap on my hoofs seems to be more of a slurry of grease and oil rather just grease so I am assuming that what is happening now is that oil is coming into the speedo gearbox from the diff, mixing with the lithium grease and coming up the speedo cable to be dumped on my feet.

I guess I can pull the speedo drive back out and once again replace the seals but I am open to any other suggestions.

Thanks

Garry

[heinkeljb]

Until you work out where all the grease is coming from, why not fit a grease catching bucket under the speedo cable? A Suitable areosol lid with a couple of holes and some wire / tie wraps ought to do it.

You could take out the speedo cable inner, give it a wipe and then just put it back in. Maybe an "O" ring on the bottom end of the cable where it joins the drive unit?

John

[AustHaflinger]

Was planning to cable tie a kitchen sponge to the lower side of the speedo to catch the excess - hadn't thought about removing the inner cable - good idea I will give it a go.

At least my speedo cable is well lubricated - still bounces around a little though.

Garry

[Techmogogy]

Replace it with an electronic VDO gauge and be done with bouncy needles and grease