Hard Grease In Cam Follower

S

Sierevello

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I bought a lot of NOS McGill cam follower bearings (CF-5/8-SB-3) and the grease in them is hard as a rock and they will barely turn. Any ideas on how to get them freely rolling again? My thought was to heat them up on a hot plate in some oil to at least loosen the grease and then put them in a jar of oil and pull a vacuum on it to try to get some oil into the roller. However, I think SB refers to sealed bearing .

Any thoughts???

Thanks,
Steve
 
Soak in mineral spirits for a couple of days. Occasionally trying to turn them. You're not going to be able to flush them out totally of the old harden grease. The mineral spirits should soften the old grease enough to use them as is or pump new grease into the bearing after assembling for use. The cam follower has seals that can get blown off by pumping too much grease into the bearing.
 
i don't think those little 5/8 cam followers have grease fittings- if they are the same ones i'm using there is no outside lubrication :)
but the mineral spirits is a good idea,
diesel fuel or kerosene will loosen the stuff up as well.
soak them and twist them to see if they free'd up and re-soak if necessary
 
Ulma Doctor,

You are correct, they don't have a place for grease zerk. I'm thinking of the larger ones.

Ken
 
Are you sure they can't be lubricated. If memory serves correctly there's a hole in the stud. Most come with a press in grease zerk. Here's a link to one showing the stud with the hole, and the hex wrench socket on the roller end. We used them by the thousands, but I don't recall the cutoff point at which they were no longer able to be lubricate.
http://www.amazon.com/McGill-Follower-Standard-Diameter-Overall/dp/B0071APND6
 
I have a pretty good selection of ones in diameters 1/2" thru 1-1/2". The 1/2 thru 3/4" I know you can't put a grease zerk on the stud end. The 1" and above do have holes for grease zerks on the stud end. But you can put a grease zerk on the roller end. The 1/2 size one would take a very small grease zerk, The hole measures about 1/8". I'm sure the 5/8 OD one is similar.
 
FullSizeRender%2B%25281%2529.jpg
you can't see the hole in the picture but, the little plug is inserted into the center hole on the big end.
you can grease it when it's new ,before installing the plug, with a needle point grease gun tip.
but after you put the plug in you'd need to extract the plug to grease the cam follower
 
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You can also get press in grease zerks to put in the hole instead of the plug IF you can find the right OD one to press in.
 
im curious as to what these are for, how they are used, application...
 
chevydyl said:
im curious as to what these are for, how they are used, application...
Click to expand...

Steady rest rollers, guide rollers for slides, support rollers for heavy machinery, just to name a few. Their primary use was for cams.
 
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