Rear oil seal ,Wheel Hub . DESTROYED , UTTERLY STUFFED .

[Ray Edsall]

G,Day all . Just pulled of the rear wheel , to find out why there was a dirty great big patch of oil on the floor of my shed. When i pulled the hub of ,i found that the inner oil seal had destroyed itself . Bit,s and pieces of seal every where .Has anyone had this happen to them . I am replacing the stuffed oil seal with a twin lip seal . Has anyone had any experiance with this type of seal .Did i put the original seal in to far ? , maybe .Any advice would be helpful Thanks Ray

[morrisguy]

Ray

Was it a leather hub seal that broke up ? Those seals are normally soaked in warm oil to soften them before you fit them. Was it gear oil from the diff on the floor ? Sounds like you may have overfilled the diff a little. Check to see if the seal journal is OK , not scored or worn . You can fit a speedi sleeve to it I think .

When I first got a Jeep, I overfilled the rear diff and the oil leaked out of the LH rear hub seal onto the ground

[Kaegi]

also if the outer seal has failed you will get gear oil to the inner seal. in theory you are not supposed to. the inner should hold back gear oil tho.

[motto]

A not unusual mistake made by owner/restorers is to completely pack the cavity between the bearings with grease. Often this will result in the seal being overwhelmed over a period of time as temperature and air pressure changes work like a pump even whilst static.
The bearings should be packed and grease in the hub only sufficient to prevent corrosion.
On two occasions now I have purchased vehicles with overfilled hubs and both required complete brake lining replacement due to contamination. In one case a couple of the seals were incorrect and had been displaced resulting in a massive amount of grease escaping.
Murphy's Law has it that if something can be done wrong it will be done wrong, sometime, someplace.

David

[Ian Jamieson]

Hi Ray,
if you have oil on the floor then this has entered the hub from the outer seal. Once the oil gets into the hub it mixes with the grease and overloads the inner hub seal.

As Morrisguy said the leather lip seals need to be softened before installation, however I suspect that seal has been in place for a while so I would be having a close look at the outer seal and the diff breather

Cheers
Ian