Yet another axle seal - C175 Auto

[Jeff-C175 7,206]

Fortunately, the axle steel being much harder than the cast iron hub caused the majority of the wear to the hub itself, some 50-60 thousandths as I recall.  Wear to the axle was limited to only 2-3 thousandths, and only at the ends of the hub because of the way it was wobbling I suppose.  The 'center' of the contact area was maybe worn 0.001 or so.

 

I have to confess that I did spooge a bit of the 660 onto the axle shaft itself to take up some of this 'slop'.  I might kick myself for this if I ever have to remove that hub, so hopefully I won't!

 

I cleaned up the area around the keyway with a flat file and some plumbers sanding cloth strip just to knock off the sharp edges that were raised from the key banging around in the slot.

 

Before sliding the seal on I covered the key slot with electrical tape.  Once the seal is driven home it's well clear of the keyway so there are no worries about it being damaged once installed.

 

By the way, I like the OEM seals MUCH better than the 11124 replacement seals.  The OEM seal actually has a small reversed 'lip' on the OUTSIDE toward the hub, in addition to the regular lip pointing in toward the tranny.  I believe the purpose of this small lip is to exclude dirt from working it's way in.  I read a few application notes from Timken SKF that indicate this is the purpose and they have a seal line with this feature.

 

If I HAD to use the 11124 seals (which we know are HALF the width of the OEM), I would strongly consider installing TWO.  But I think the inner one would be installed in the normal fashion and driven to the bottom of the bore.  The second one I would TURN AROUND and mount backwards in order to keep out the dirt.  It might be a bit difficult to install and drive in backwards though, so it might be a dumb idea, but I bet with an appropriate size seal driver it would be easy enough.

Edited August 17, 2013 by Jeffpicks