how nasty is the gasoline?
what are we talking here?
Smells bad and the benzene it contains is a big time carcinogen.
OTOH, if I were sitting around the house and not skating because my bearings were all froze up I wouldn't hesitate to use some gas if that is all I had.
You could clean your bearings with soap and water too. Just make sure you rinse them real well and use a hair dryer or some compressed air to dry them off and then *immediately* lube them.
70% alcohol is 30% water. When you use water (soap suds, citrus cleaner, high water content alcohol, etc.) to clean your bearings you should make sure you dry and lube them right away.
The point being that you don't want to leave them sitting around with moisture in them because they are apt to rust.
So far i've only had cleaning expirience with "Lucky's", "Black Panthers" and "Greaseballs".
The Lucky's cleaned out o.k., however, i can't seem to get the plastic "removable" shild off without some sort of bending or other damage, now i just don't take them apart.
The black panthers have a rubber seal over both the metal and plastic shild so its almost imposible to tell which side i was pulling off. Destroyed that on, woops... the rest cleaned out decently w/out opening up.
The Greaseballs have metal shields on both sides so it is imposible to get open without compleatly destroying a shield.
So, what i'm woundering is, is it really worth all the time and efort? To actually open up the bearing before cleaning, and if so, what are some brands that allow easy access to the inside?
Ive got two sets of Sealed Abec 5 bearings that came stock in two loaded completes and ive been trying to open the seals with an exacto knife like EBasil said but without any luck there seems to be an edge where the seal meets the bearing and there is a small 2cm gap in the edge where ive been trying to open them with th knife. Anyone got any suggestions. Thanks
Quote:
Originally Posted by EBasil
Andrew, they still need to be cleaned and lubed, they just stay clean longer. You can remove the seals with an X-acto blade to get in there, and I think you should take both sides off. Then, clean as described here or with a "$1.25 Bearing Cleaner", lube & rebuild.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Andrew in Ontario
Im using 'sealed' bearings that apparently dont need to be cleaned, but they dont sound very good.
how do u clean sealed bearings?
EDIT: so I answered my own question after ten minutes of messing with it, and I figured others with sealed bearings might be wondering the same thing so I made some pictures to show how I did it. It turned out that the gap i mentioned was a ring... I had no idea till one flew out and hit me in the face. so the ring is cut at and angle each facing a different way in order to get the seal off you first have to remove the ring I found it much easier to remove from one side (the side marked with a star in the enlarged picture in the diagram) I used the exacto knife to get behind the ridge in the ring and pulled it out and made sure the thumb on my other hand was over the seal to keep the ring from springing free like it did the first time. After the ring is removed the seal (green thing) doesn’t just fall out like I had hoped you have to mess with it I found that taping the bearing on a flat surface helps and once the seals off you should be set to clean them. I hope that helps some people it would’ve been very helpful to me like 30 min ago .
P.S. I have way too much free time on my hands that’s why I made diagrams, and I figured the pictures were crappy and you couldn’t really see much.
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Last edited by Mjolnir; 10-08-2007 at 07:00 PM.
Reason: Answered my Question.
I use a needle (no exacto blade here) and pull up the shield. I discovered using an ultra-sonic cleaner is the way to go. Good friend of mine sells them. So freakin' easy to clean bearings now.
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anyone ever tried to clean Sector 9 Greaseball Bearings? they came stock in my first board and haven't been cleaned for two and a half years they sound horrible but i can't find a way to open the seals. I don't really ride the board much anymore but recently a lot of my friends have been learning to ride on it because they don't like how flexy my loaded boards are, and how stiff my Demonseed is. So i figured i might as well do them a favor and have some clean bearings in it. Thanks for any help .
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[font="Fixedsys"][color="Red"][i][center][quote]There is (not) more to life than increasing its speed. -Gandhi
anyone ever tried to clean Sector 9 Greaseball Bearings? they came stock in my first board and haven't been cleaned for two and a half years they sound horrible but i can't find a way to open the seals. I don't really ride the board much anymore but recently a lot of my friends have been learning to ride on it because they don't like how flexy my loaded boards are, and how stiff my Demonseed is. So i figured i might as well do them a favor and have some clean bearings in it. Thanks for any help .
They don't have seals, the shields are crimped on, so you won't be able to take them off. You're better off just getting really cheap new bearings.
anyone ever tried to clean Sector 9 Greaseball Bearings? they came stock in my first board and haven't been cleaned for two and a half years they sound horrible but i can't find a way to open the seals. ....
You can "convert" those crimp-sealed bearings sold by S9, Gravity and others, so that they can be cleaned: use an icepick to poke a hole in the steel shield on one side of each bearing. Then, pry out the seal/shield and throw it away. Now, you've got one-sided bearings, similar to a Bones Red or Biltin, and you can clean them using the $1.25 Bearing Cleaner method.
After you've got them nicely cleaned, and dried, relube them and just install them in wheels with the open sides to the interior of the wheels, just like you would Bones Reds or Biltins. Voila'!
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Re: How to Clean/Maintain Your Bearings
Re: How to Clean/Maintain Your Bearings
Re: How to Clean/Maintain Your Bearings