Diamond drive bearings shot 2200 miles

[mphfreak]

I suggest anyone who hasnt looked at there diamond drive bearings to do so if tehy havnt in awhile. i had picked up a bearing and seal kit this fall and didnt get around to changin them till last nite. Good thing I have only made about 100 miles this year. When i opened her up the gear oil had some metallic in it but not too bad. If i were to assume everything was ok i wouldve by the oil. I checked it out and the small bearing that the one transfer gear sits in (the smallest of the bearings) the cover had come off and I had found 3 small pieces of the roller bearing clasps sitting right there. I changed all three bearings and even the large bearing was noisy. The seals were all good but if you want to change the upper transfer bearing you need a seal. Im going to cross reference the bearings and pick them up at napa for my other M sled. I caught this in time. Good thing because the next trip was to the hills for a week.
Jay

 

[beeonaplug]

You caught that one just in time. I'll bet it would of gernaded the next ride out. That's a good idea cross referencing the bearings. Think Ill try that. I've got close to 5000 km. on mine with no problems. I change the oil a couple of times a year and use synthetic 75-80 gear oil.

 

[bdietz]

would you mind putting the cross ref part numbers up here I would like to have a spare set on hand
Are all the m sleds the same
what about the seal can that be a jobber as well

 

[mphfreak]

Yeah I used 75W 90W full synthetic aswell. good to hear because I was unsure if that was a good idea. When I replaced everything i just used varsol and ran it through the planetary`s and such. Today i drained the oil after about 5 km ride and wow there was a lot of small fillings. I removed everything ahgain and checked to make sure everything was ok. Everything was. I removed the planetary and used a full can of brakeleen as i spun the planetarys. wow alot of fillings came out. I put everything back together and filled the case with diesel. then just turnrd the track about 20 revolutions by hand and drained. Irepeated this about 3 times. I then filled it back with oil and put 10 km`s on it. drained the oil once again and it is now clean. Those fillings sure get into everything and are hard to get out.

 

[Catman10]

I pull my diamond drive out every year and go through it completely as a preventative maintenence and have been glad I did a few times, if you take care of them they are great but they do seem to have a lot of problems if you just run them without changing the oil. While you have the diamond drive apart you should do the bearing upgrade, there is a post on here about this.

 

[catgod]

I pull my diamond drive out every year and go through it completely as a preventative maintenence and have been glad I did a few times, if you take care of them they are great but they do seem to have a lot of problems if you just run them without changing the oil. While you have the diamond drive apart you should do the bearing upgrade, there is a post on here about this.

Yeah if you don't take a peek at the diamond drive once in awhile it could have some nasty surprizes in store for you and your wallet. At least BD Extreme sells some reasonably priced planetary gears now for around $200.00 which is much better than Cats $500 for the same part. If you are changing out bearings check out BC Bearing or other bearing shops for prices. I bought all the bearings for my diamond drive through BC Bearing better quality bearings than the Cat ones and more cost effective. As for the oil in my drive I started to use Amsoil outboard full synthetic 75-90 last year it seems ok so far with 500 miles and no problems yet. I fiqured that outboard gears take a pretty good beating from shock loading plus the outboard oil has some moisture control properties and its around $10 a litre. I usually change/flush my diamond drive every 500 miles its a pain but worth it to know what is going on in there.

 

[mphfreak]

Made 50 miles on my rebuild and it piled up anyways. guess i didnt get to it in time. Will be checking all my DD sleds and changing oil every couple hundred Km`s from now on.

 

[xxxbuck19xxx]

Made 50 miles on my rebuild and it piled up anyways. guess i didnt get to it in time. Will be checking all my DD sleds and changing oil every couple hundred Km`s from now on.

DD puts in total crap offshore bearings. Tough to find good steel nowadays. I use Schaeffer's 75.90 Gear Oil and its sweet. DD oil turns into some form of glue after 50 miles. Those thinking a flush is sufficient, all I have to say is "if you only knew" what is going on inside and what it looks like inside. You MUST open it up to feel good about what i'm saying because it can become a total yard sale if you don't. DD fluid comes out like caulking and you can't get it all out no matter how hard you try. Also, the metal filings get caught on magnets inside, and they are strong magnets so you will need to clean it all out with some form of solvent and then get an even stronger magnet of your own to get those off the DD magnets. Those bearings inside fail easy if you ride hard at all so don't turn a blind eye and think a flush is ok. You will regret it to the tune of 1000 dollars. Besides look on hardcoresledder forum and there is a writeup on there that a junior high student could follow to take it off and repair it. Its worth it guys. Hope I don't sound condescending.