Grease vs ATF in the hub?

Hello All!

Forgive me if this has been discussed, but I could not find anything specific on the issue. I have been hearing much chatter about the difference between repacking new hubs w/ ATF rather than Grease. Any opinions either way?

 

How do you get the ATF to stay in the hub?

 

Thats what I was thinking....

 

ATF is automatic transmission fluid. #1, it's too thin for wheel bearings. #2, you'd never seal up a hub well enough to keeep it in there.

 

Yeah, it sounded wierd to me too. No joke, though, google it and you'll see that people are actually using ATF instead of grease in their hubs.

 

sounds messy.
i suppose i could jack one side WAY up.
then fill it with ATF and seal it with formagasket.
and repeat with the other side.

 

I use a very thin coat of either white lithium grease (Lubriplate is a name brand) or moly grease. Both work fine.
You want a very thin coat.
Don't see how you're going to keep the ATF from running out of the hub, mixing with the wheel bearing grease thinning it out, or keeping it sticking to the parts needed when it's sitting.

One other thing, I'd think removing the factory grease from new hubs and putting in something else would eliminate the warranty.....

 

Yeah, I wouldn't want to try out the latest internet rumor. Especially one that seems somewhat far fetched.

If had the most luck with the semi-fluid grease that goes in CV joints.
That was recommended to me by a learned master tech as the best for anything running AISIN hubs (toyota,isuzu,mitsubishi,etc.) and worked fantastic in my '80 blazer and jeep warn hubs.

 

I googled around and couldn't find anything about "packing" hubs in ATF. What I did see were several suggestions of lubing the manual locking hubs with a coating of ATF. Basically this makes sense, you want to avoid heavy grease on the manual hub parts (NOT wheelbearings, which need to be packed with high-temp wheelbearing grease!!). I use white lithium grease on my hubs and have never had a problem. I suppose in a very cold climate they might get stiff to turn, which means a light coating of ATF might be a better lubricant than any grease.