U Joints 71 olds cutlass

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Old February 26th, 2012 | 10:31 AM
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U Joints 71 olds cutlass

Hi I have a 1971 olds cutlass and was wondering what type of grease I should use for the u joints. Does my vehicle use the same type of grease for all grease inserts or should different types of grease only be used in certain areas of the car? I am not a gear head by any means but I am trying to learn, any help would be much appreciated.
Old February 26th, 2012 | 11:07 AM
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Any good quality grease gun grease should be fine for the tractor parts in our cars.
There are really top-notch greases available at double the price, and I tend to use those, but I'm not sure that they work any better in this application than an ordinary brand-name grease.

And, yes, I use the same grease for all grease fittings (but I use wheel bearing grease for wheel bearings).

- Eric
Old February 26th, 2012 | 11:15 AM
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If you have disc brakes you will want wheel bearing grease, the red stuff from Penzzoil, 707 I think it is called.
Old February 26th, 2012 | 11:20 AM
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Originally Posted by boese1978
If you have disc brakes you will want wheel bearing grease, the red stuff from Penzzoil, 707 I think it is called.
He's talking about the U-joints on his driveshaft - brake type doesn't matter.

- Eric
Old February 27th, 2012 | 03:22 PM
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Ok, thank you guys for the help. I was able to get the grease needed for the u joints. However, when I went to grease the u joints, i noticed that there are no grease zerks there. Would I actually have to take apart the U joints along with the DS and grease them individually? I dont know if I was to careless and didnt look hard enough or they just arent there.
Old February 27th, 2012 | 03:56 PM
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It sounds like you still have the original u joints in there. The repacement u joints come with zerk fittings.
Old February 27th, 2012 | 04:16 PM
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Originally Posted by don71
The repacement u joints come with zerk fittings.
Some replacement U-joints come with grease fittings. The cheaper ones don't.

Might as well just leave 'em 'till they wear out, and replace 'em then.
... Unless you want to make work for yourself, or you're about to take a very long trip.

- Eric
Old February 27th, 2012 | 05:07 PM
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Well crap....I am going to be taking a 1200 mile trip from washington to california this friday. So hopefully the cutty doesnt fail me. It has been driving very smooth as of lately, I will for sure change out the u joints when I get down to California but how much of a chance is there that the u joints will fail me half way through this trip? Is it very very common that u joints fail quickly on these vehicles? And how will I be able to tell that I am having a problem with the u joints?
Old February 27th, 2012 | 05:50 PM
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Originally Posted by JPS
... how much of a chance is there that the u joints will fail me half way through this trip? Is it very very common that u joints fail quickly on these vehicles? And how will I be able to tell that I am having a problem with the u joints?
Naaaah. They don't fail quickly - they take their time.

As they wear, they introduce slack into the drivetrain, which ends up as a clicking or clanking. They tend to make plenty of irritating noise before they actually fail.

Personally, I'd let 'em go until they started annoying me, but a lot of folks on here have OCD, and there's always a wise guy who had one fail and rolled ten thousand feet down a mountain while off-roading, who'll argue about how important it is that they be pristine.

They cost about $20 apiece (for good ones), and it should take about an hour to change both, provided you've got a big vise, a bigger hammer, and a set of reasonably expendable sockets, so if you've got reason to worry about them, just change 'em. If you don't have any reason to worry, then leave 'em alone - they could last another 100,000 miles.

- Eric
Old February 27th, 2012 | 05:53 PM
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Eric, your the man. I appreciate all the help and when I make the trip down to cali, ill be sure to let you guys know how it went. Thanks for everything buddy

Jordan
Old February 27th, 2012 | 06:03 PM
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Think nothing of it. We're all glad to help out.

'Course I didn't tell you about the time I had a catastrophic failure of a front driveshaft U-joint in a '77 Blazer - the shaft flailed around and dented the passenger floor up about six inches before I could stop.

But that was just weird, and I've never heard of that happening to a 2-wheel drive car.

- Eric
Old February 27th, 2012 | 07:09 PM
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Originally Posted by MDchanic
Might as well just leave 'em 'till they wear out, and replace 'em then.... Unless you want to make work for yourself.- Eric
Mine are still stock. No fittings. But I'm going to replace them this year just because it's probably time after 40 years and 120K
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