Oil on steering knuckles

[SimonD]

Took truck for a spin after a month and all was fine. When back i looked under the chassis and noticed that I had small oil patches on each sterring knuckle. The front axle was rebuilt 5k miles ago. I was wondering if the axle shaft oil seal was leaking but it seems odd that both would go and the oil was a bit more on the steering knuckle than the rear of the swivel hub. I'll watch for a bit but could this be a "lack of use" issue. Any thoughts? Sorry that the pics are from a crap blackberry and no editing facility.
[attachment=1:2ja1ehqp]IMG00031-20120526-1308.jpg[/attachment:2ja1ehqp]
[attachment=0:2ja1ehqp]IMG00030-20120526-1306.jpg[/attachment:2ja1ehqp]

 

[frank rabbets]

It may be oil out of the hub grease rather than EP oil out of the axle itself. A quick smell would confirm. Worth checking the 4 studs each side for tightness but to me does not look too bad unless it smells of EP in which case grease may be getting into axle and diluting the effect of the EP oil.

Oil does tend to drain out of grease when standing and the hub wiper/seals will not keep oil in.

Frank

 

[Jon Wildsmith]

Any chance of a picture that shows the swivels as well?

 

[SimonD]

Thanks Frank - didn't smell of EP grease. I'll try tomorrow for a better pic. Away from home so i can't edit pic size making it difficult to put the whole pic up. I thought the size limit was 2meg but when i tried to upload 300kb files the attachments didn't work. Anyway more tomorrow.

 

[SimonD]

Sister in law has lost her camera while packing for a holiday
Therefore couple more crapberry pics which do show that outside the steering knuckle the hubs are reasonably dry.

 

[Towpack]

Looks like leakage past the nut/stud to me. I think it's just the oil base settling out of the grease. I've had this same issue and found the offending nut/stud had loosened slightly. I removed all the studs one by one and applied a little sealer to the threads NOT LOCTITE! and problem was cured.