Toad

Active Member
I'm just about to attempt a change of oil in my axles and swivel pins. I've been looking at Paddocks site and I see they do stuff called one shot grease for the swivel pins.

I want to do the best for the car so can anyone tell me what is best for the swivel pins, oil or grease. I assume if grease is used then it is a permanent lubricant and not changeable like oil would be.

I have a 94 300Tdi and would like to know anyones thoughts on this subject.
 
landrover now use 1 shot grease in the tractor joints instead of oil, this is for all vehicles regardless of age. your right, it is non-serviceable (hense the name '1 shot') and seems to be the way forward
 
firstly check to see if you have a drain off on the swivels as mine the later 300 tdi says they have but they have not ! even microcat says they have the bleed off nipple !
if there is a drain off valves i would say they have been filled with oil get shot off the crap stuff in there and fill it with the one shot grease plus it will stop the swivels from weeping if they ant already
 
landrover now use 1 shot grease in the tractor joints instead of oil, this is for all vehicles regardless of age. your right, it is non-serviceable (hense the name '1 shot') and seems to be the way forward

If this appears to be the way forward then I will give it a go. Thanks for the reply mate.
 
firstly check to see if you have a drain off on the swivels as mine the later 300 tdi says they have but they have not ! even microcat says they have the bleed off nipple !
if there is a drain off valves i would say they have been filled with oil get shot off the crap stuff in there and fill it with the one shot grease plus it will stop the swivels from weeping if they ant already

Ah, I've not checked if the bleed nipples are there. If not then how would you change the oil, or was leaving bleed nipples off supposed to prevent changing the oil?

Even if the nipples are there, I haven't yet checked to see if the previous owner has already used one stop grease.

I was also wondering, is the bottle of one stop grease that Paddocks is selling sufficient to do one swivel or two because they don't mention how much is in the bottle.
 
if they have used oil and you ant got the nipple you will have to use a bottle with a tube on it to draw the old ****e out , im no expert but i only used one packet of grease per wheel . the newer 300 tdi,s were not designed to be filled with oil grease only
 
if they have used oil and you ant got the nipple you will have to use a bottle with a tube on it to draw the old ****e out , im no expert but i only used one packet of grease per wheel . the newer 300 tdi,s were not designed to be filled with oil grease only

I ordered myself a 500ml syringe to make it easy to put new oil in both the axles and swivels. I will probably use that to suck the crappy stuff out of the swivels if there aren't any nipples in them. Thanks for the replies.
 
My two penneth:

If you have the empty and fill plugs in your swivels and you have good seals and smooth swivel balls, I would go for EP 90 oil rather than the "1 shot grease"

My reasoning is this: the oil will penetrate better than the grease (even thought the grease is not very thick) and therefore give greater protection.

The main reason why LR moved over to the grease is that they can't seem to make seals that hold oil in for very much longer than about a week :p After that they would start to weep oil, lose lubrication and fail mot's.

The downside with oil is, how do you know if the full quota of oil is still in there? doing it's job?? Because it's still leaking :D:D:D It's not like the engine with an easy to access dipstick.


PS "One shot grease" is for one side only, so you need two if you're doing both sides.
 
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My two penneth:

If you have the empty and fill plugs in your swivels and you have good seals and smooth swivel balls, I would go for EP 90 oil rather than the "1 shot grease"

My reasoning is this: the oil will penetrate better than the grease (even thought the grease is not very thick) and therefore give greater protection.

The main reason why LR moved over to the grease is that they can't seem to make seals that hold oil in for very much longer than about a week :p After that they would start to weep oil, lose lubrication and fail mot's.

The downside with oil is, how do you know if the full quota of oil is still in there? doing it's job?? Because it's still leaking :D:D:D It's not like the engine with an easy to access dipstick.


PS "One shot grease" is for one side only, so you need two if you're doing both sides.

Thanks Big Lad. You have certainly given me something to mull over. The last time I looked at my swivel balls they were nice and smooth with no leaks, however I live in a very salty atmosphere and cars really suffer here so I don't expect they will stay that way.

If the bleed nipples are there and I manage to release them and get old oil out then I will replace with oil. Having said that, if I don't get old oil out I will have to assume it has escaped via a leak. In that case I will fill with one shot grease to prevent it happening again.
 
get a syrynge with some syphoning tube on the end, drain ALL fluid and put 1 sachet per swivel, job done. be sure not to OVERFILL as this can result in grease finding its way out and onto the brakes!
 
What's all this about bleed nipples? Surely you mean drain plugs? You don't bleed your swivel housings. The one shot question is down to personal preference. If you like checking the oil in your swivel housings and having it leak out through the seals go for ep90. If you don't want leaky seals and checking the oil every so often put one shot in there. For me it's a no brainer.
 
What's all this about bleed nipples? Surely you mean drain plugs? You don't bleed your swivel housings. The one shot question is down to personal preference. If you like checking the oil in your swivel housings and having it leak out through the seals go for ep90. If you don't want leaky seals and checking the oil every so often put one shot in there. For me it's a no brainer.

You beat me to it, and where are the "drain off valves"

If your disco is fitted with oil lubed swivels then you will have a fill plug a drain plug and in the middle a small level plug, grease based swivels just have a square fill plug. Using grease will not stop leaks as I have found out with a damp patch at the bottom of one of my seals. No drips though. In the old days when I had a swivel leaking oil I just put in a few grease gun trigger pulls of LM grease, it stop the drips. :)
 
Ok folks I think the grease option is maybe the wisest way to go. You've convinced me. I do infact have a drain plug on the swivels so whatever is in them should drain ok. They are also leak free and the balls are smooth.

I see one of you mentions sachets of grease. I think Paddocks sell what appear to be bottles. I assume a sachet or a bottle is a measured amount for one swivel? Thanks to all for your input, it helps me a lot as I am no mechanic, I just do these things if I can to save a few bob so really like to be sure that what I'm doing is right.
 

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