Repacking wheel bearings-2013 Kodiak 221RBSL

CanuckTraveller · 10-03-2013, 04:55 PM

I have a 2013 Kodiak 221 RBSL purchased September 21st 2013.
Just had the annual inspection done (required by Provincial law here). Everything was ok as it should be in a year old trailer.
However the mechanic (who has to be a licensed mechanic by the Province) advised he felt a bit of play in the wheels.
I told him that the trailer had about 6000 miles on it from the factory to the dealer in Quebec, to me in NB, to Florida & around to a few state parks & home in NB.
He suggested that I have the wheel bearings packed. I made an appointment yesterday & had it completed.

$200 later for the work as he had to put in new seals which he changed and showed me the old seals which were leaking.
Purpose of this thread is to let others know that they might want to check this out either by themselves or a Trailer maintenance shop.

The shop mechanic told me (before doing the work) when I suggested that injecting grease into the bearings through the fittings in the hub was the manufacturers recommendation that they would not recommend this as many times the grease comes out into the brakes causing brake failure.

Anyway not to cause a lot of discussion on whether or not to inject grease or not through the wheel grease fittings I put this on here to let others know my experience.
Hope it helps.

memgrove · 10-03-2013, 09:43 PM

Do you know what axles you have on your trailer?

CanuckTraveller · 10-04-2013, 12:27 AM

Mike, They have on the rubber gromment on the axel where you can inject grease the name "Lippert Component"
Hope this helps.
.....Ernie

memgrove · 10-04-2013, 01:54 AM

Ugh, those are the ones I have and am currently worrying about a greased brake shoe issue. This info just makes more work for me on Saturday. I guess its time to buy some seals and get out the camera to show the dealer if I find grease in the drum.

CanuckTraveller · 10-04-2013, 04:01 PM

Mike; My unit was over warranty by two weeks, if I had of got the work done a tad sooner, taking a picture or two & saved the seals I might have went after Dutchmen or the dealer (they are 400 miles away) for warranty.

But I did not so I paid the bill, heading out in two weeks for Florida and have not got enough time (or patience) to argue with others on this.
I sure did not want to face a breakdown on a 2000 Mile trip. The $200 bill was good insurance. However it makes one wonder why these seals are not more robust. (one year & 6000 miles seems a tad short to be repacking bearings & replacing seals)
Sure glad the factory is not making a truck for me, I have had my Chevy Diesel for 10 years, 120,000 miles, knock on wood, few problems, have not had wheel bearing seals leaking.....yet.
I see where Dexter has wheel bearings with lifetime no repacking required, love to have those! In light of the possible extra money for those the $200 maintenance after only one year seems kinda high.

Let me know what you find, just wondering what year your unit is & mileage
you have driven.
.....Ernie

sundancer 87 · 10-04-2013, 04:31 PM

Providing the mechanic pulled the hubs to pack the wheel bearings he would have had to pull the seals any way to properly remove the rear bearings. Why the seals had leaked may be dur to a few reasons. One, bad seals, which is unusual in itself. Two, improper installation of same. Three, perhaps someone pumped the hub full of grease and therefore pushed the grease past the seals.

It's not always a bad this or a bad that, it sometimes is improper procedures by others.

Regarding having loose wheel bearings, they do need to be adjusted occasionally due to wear and, possibly in this case, a simple process of new bearings seating in. New bearings are 'set' by various means. One of which is to tighten the jam nut until the wheel gets tight and won't turn easily. That sets the bearing in the race. Once the tightness is achieved the jam nut is backed off to allow the wheel to spin freely. Then the cotter pin is installed and not always does the pin align with the hole. Sometimes the nut has to backed off a little more to allow the pin to pass through the spindle. This can contribute to the bearing being a little more loose than wanted or needed. The final player in this process is the human. What feels tight to me might be ok to you. It's the interpretation of the human and not necessarily a problem with the component.

So it is encumbent upon the owner to have the bearings checked, repacked properly as necessary and take the opinion of the mechanic as to cause. I don't pump grease into the bearings because there isn't any way to determine if the rear bearing is getting properly greased. The best way, to me, is to pull the bearings and clean the old grease out, hand install new grease into them and tighten the jam not properly.

As much as we'd like to place blame on some thing when we have a problem, a lot of the time there are too many variables in place to make a solid determination of cause. In this case a bearing was loose and grease was shown to have escaped the seal. The opinion of the mechanic was given but the opinion may have been incorrect.

CanuckTraveller · 10-04-2013, 07:47 PM

"As much as we'd like to place blame on some thing when we have a problem, a lot of the time there are too many variables in place to make a solid determination of cause. In this case a bearing was loose and grease was shown to have escaped the seal. The opinion of the mechanic was given but the opinion may have been incorrect."

I agree with most of what you are saying and I am not blaming anyone or anything on this, however in this case no one pumped any grease into the bearing as the trailer is almost brand new and I am the first owner.

I guess one has to take the mechanic's word at face value as I was not there at the time of the work being done and the Mechanics in this Province has to be licensed by the Provincial authorities and I doubt that he would do anything to jeopardize his live hood just to make a little extra profit for his employer.

The purpose of this thread is not to lay blame but to forewarn anyone with a similar unit and same bearings to check them prior to any trips especially any long ones.

sundancer 87 · 10-04-2013, 08:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CanuckTraveller

"As much as we'd like to place blame on some thing when we have a problem, a lot of the time there are too many variables in place to make a solid determination of cause. In this case a bearing was loose and grease was shown to have escaped the seal. The opinion of the mechanic was given but the opinion may have been incorrect."

I agree with most of what you are saying and I am not blaming anyone or anything on this, however in this case no one pumped any grease into the bearing as the trailer is almost brand new and I am the first owner.

I guess one has to take the mechanic's word at face value as I was not there at the time of the work being done and the Mechanics in this Province has to be licensed by the Provincial authorities and I doubt that he would do anything to jeopardize his live hood just to make a little extra profit for his employer.

The purpose of this thread is not to lay blame but to forewarn anyone with a similar unit and same bearings to check them prior to any trips especially any long ones.

My statement about placing blame wasn't directly related to you, it was a general statement.

Your mechanics up there may very well be licensed but that doesn't make them all knowing on all things mechanical. The lower 48 has a gob of ASE certified mechanics but that doesn't mean anything more than passing a test to get the cert. Here's an example of what I'm saying. My Chevy dealer has ASE certified mechanics in the bay to do the automotive work. I have a Chevy 3500HD dually and had the scheduled tire rotation done. That's a pretty much forward procedure until the ASE certified mechanic didn't know enough or care enough to index the valve stems. So when it came time to check the air pressure the inner stems were covered by the outer wheels. I paid a tire shop 20 bucks to remove the wheels and index them properly so the stems would be accessible.

All in all, we do have to take the mechanic's word for what they feel caused the problem. As you said, you weren't there so you didn't get to see the operation. We aren't there when they build our RVs but we do get to see the results of their crappy work.

Not finding fault here, just making a generalized statement for member's perusal.

memgrove · 10-06-2013, 02:31 PM

Our trailer is a 2013 denali 311bhs. We picked it up from our dealer on Feb 1st. it now has about 4500 miles on it. We live in Elkhart and the unit was built in Goshen so pre delivery miles are about 30. I am going to adjust the brakes again this week to get thru the next three weekends of camping and after that we are going to tear into it.

CanuckTraveller · 10-06-2013, 03:02 PM

Thanks Mike for the update, sounds like you have accumulated the same mileage as ours, I would be interested in knowing your take on the seals, etc., when you pull the wheels.
We are nearing our time to head south to Florida in about two weeks, some glad it is not in the next few days as Hurricane Karen (now a tropical storm) is trying to make up it's mind which way to go....hope there is not another Hurricane at that time..... but it is still Hurricane season.
....Ernie

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