I changed my oil today for the first time in my thirdgen, its the first thirdgen i own so up untill now ive had trucks, which I could crawl under. So I was up at the auto parts store buying a pair of ramps to drive up on when I ran into my friends dad, who is a mechanic. I told him I was changeing my oil, and he told me that I needed to lube my chassis every 3000 miles along with the oil. Can anyone tell me how to do this? Sorry if this is the wrong forum, couldn't find a better one.

 

pretty straight forward, just about all the suspension components have grease zerks on them, just they're all covered in about 3" of road grime, so clean all that **** off the suspension parts and you'll find little grease zerks, i don't remember where they all are or how many, depends what aftermarket goodies you have too. But after you find all the zerks you just grab a grease gun and pump some lithium grease in there until you see some of it start comming out in spaces around the zerks/joints. (if somebody has a better method, lemme know, thats what we've always done on our farm equipment). You might feel a slight difference in the smoothness of the car on the road...it helps.

 

Step one: Buy yourself a Chiltons manual $20 well worth it

When you are putting grease in, look around the grease zerk, you will see what two parts come together and most of them have a boot right around it, pump grease utill that moves, you don't want to break the boot.

Get the manual and read it you will learn alot, and when you are reading it get under the car and try to find what they are talkn about...


PS, get a jack and some stands, they are much better, how are you gonna get a wheel off if you need to. Go to Wal-mart, stands are like $15 not sure what a jack is but they are well worth it. Don't use the jack without the stands.

 

The ramps were relativley cheap, and are easier to use than the jack stands. They are find for what i'm doing right now, oil, transmission fulid, fuel filter. When brake time comes around i will invest in some stands.

 

I have a Hayes manual, nothing about this
Anyone know where or how many of these thigns there are?

 

I think it's 11...

Don't quote me on that. It should be somewhere around there, tho.

 

all the joints on the steering linkages will need to be lubed (tie rod ends, idler arm) and the ball joints will need to be lubed. Basically, look under the lower control arm next to the front wheel and when you wipe away all the junk, there will be grease fittings there for the ball joints. All the others are pretty self explanitory. Everywhere a steering linkage meets another linkage, there will be a fitting for the joint hiding under all the grime.

 

hey, dont forget to lube the steering stops!

Not many people do those. Know that clicking, and even grinding, noise you hear everytime you lock the steering to one side? Welp...throw a little grease on the steering stops and that goes away.

While you're motivated to lube things up....you notice everytime you open your door it makes a sickening creaking noise that you just dont pay attention to? Well, spray a little 10w-40 (or even better, oil) on the door hinge and bushing and POW! it's gone!

Sorry....i used to be a lube tech at one point, that was the one thing that drove me crazy...cars coming in with creaking doors. Dosnt that bother people....? simple fix too...you'd think they'd teach that sort of thing in high school...

But anyway, we're in a lubing mood. Why not spray a little oil or 10w-40 on the door striker and latch, you'd be surprised how easier your door shuts.

Notice how hard it is to turn your key in the lock? Spray 10w-40 with the little red tube into the lock cylinder. Turns much easier, and wont freeze in winter (also a great way to unfreeze it in winter).

 

Well I already got to the door thing, the lock is lubed, but doesn't turn right because the only key I have for it is extremly worn, I have the key codes, but I just havn't gotten around to it yet. The clinking and such when I turn my wheel all the way is because for some reason my tires hit the tire well piece, whatever its called. As for the steering stops, Ill do that
So the suspention and teh steering stuff needs to be lubed, doesn't sound too bad.

 

Good advice on the lubrication. A couple more items that the I would suggest are:

1. Clean the park brake cables and lube the exposed ends near the housings with white lithium grease;

2. Lubricate all hinges and latches (hood and rear deck, too) and lift strut pivots with engine oil;

3. Clean the front suspension, torque arm, and rear control arm, and shock/strut bushings and apply a pure silicone spray to the rubber;

4. Clean and silicone the body seals, like those around the doors, windows, hood and hatch;

5. Remove the trim caps on the upper strut mounts and apply a few drops of engine oil to the upper bearings;

6. If you have an early model with four wheel discs, apply a small amount of clean brake fluid to the actuating screws and levers for the rear park brakes;

7. If you live in a colder climate, use dry graphite in the lock cylinders instead of oil;

8. Inspect the differential housing oil level, and manual transmission oil level.

 

quick note about the silicone and water based paints. If you have the water based paint on your car, go very sparinly on the silicone spray. Itll eat the paint! I now have bare metal spots around all my weather stripping b/c the silicone ate the paint off.

 

24-7,

It probably wasn't the silicone itself that damaged the paint surface, but the carrier solvent or additives in the spray. Silicone itself is quite benign and inert, which is why it was approved for human breast implants. However, many silicone sprays have highly active solvents that thin the silicone enough to be sprayed. Some of these include tricholoethylene, methylene chloride, and some even used to include carbon tetrachloride. Any of these will strip paint easily.

If you select your spray carefully, or use a liquid silicone oil, there should be no danger of damaging the paint, or anything else. I happen to have a readily available supply of silicone dielectric oil used as coolant in large transformers. It gets drained every 15-20 years from some large transformers, but is ideal for use as a body and bushing (and weatherseal) lubricant if you can get you hands on it before it is recycled. That can be sprayed with a pump sprayer or brushed on easily.

 

huh... i though of that ahead of time and left the doors open overnight to dry. gues all the solvent must not have evaporated off in time or soked into the rubber. Ill keep that in mind for the future.

 

So lithium greese in everything?

 

pretty much

 

Something like this,
right ball-joint, right tie-rod, right inner tie-rod, (2)idler arm, centerlink, left inner tie-rod, left tie-rod, left ball-joint. Grease rated for wheel bearings is stickier and longer lasting than just plain lube IMO.

 

Mobil 1 grease for me.

 

i like mobil 1 synthetic grease myself cause....well it costs 4x more than any other grease, it seems to run out much faster, and my grease gun has a hard time pumping it.

But....it IS synthetic....

 

yep, M1 for me too:hail:

 

Well, I got under their today, and I found nine zerks on the stearing linkages, which I lubed. I think those are all of them (according to the hayes manual anyway, I was wrong, it was in their). Thanks so much to everyone who helped me with this.