The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Engine Shop Graphite grease?

I'm re-assembling the u-joint housing on my 54 half ton torque tube. The housing was leaking tranmission oil, so I took apart the u-joint and housing to install new gaskets and seals.

The shop manual talks about lubing one of the gasket/seals with graphite grease. This seal rides along the outside of the torque tube ball housing, so I think it needs to slide around a bit during normal use. Graphite seems like a good choice, but I can't seem to find any graphite grease.

The only graphite I can find at my FLAPS is dry graphite powder, and that doesn't seem like the right stuff. I thought about using a light coat of normal grease, but I'm guessing the book specifically mentions graphite for a reason.

What do you folks think? What have you used? Thanks.

Greg,
When I want an xtra slippy grease Ive used what you found ..I will take regular wheelbearing grease and add powdered graphite to it an mix it up.
Juts a thought
Tim

It seems I bought grap. grease once but could only find it in tube form (like for a greas gun) and not in a tub.

I like your idea Tim. Thanks for the suggestion. I guess I'll have to do that if I can't find "graphite grease", whatever that means.

Greg;

Tim's has a good idea. BTW I found these on Amazon, of all places, with a quick search:

http://www.amazon.com/HyHeet-Graphi...utomotive&qid=1225400313&sr=1-17
http://www.amazon.com/Graphtek-Micr...utomotive&qid=1225400313&sr=1-21

Tim's suggestion is probably more practical for the small amount you need. Good Luck.

Sims

Thanks for the links SimS. The first one there describes the product as "grease fortified with graphite". This sounds a lot like Tim's idea -- "fortify" the grease with some of the graphite powder.

I'm pretty sure this is not one of those things that has to be perfect. I'm guessing the graphite just adds some longevity to the gasket in question. I don't think the graphite (or the lack of it) will affect its ability to seal. The gasket set for this is not too expensive, so I'll try Tim's idea, and see how many miles I get out of it.

For what it is worth, I googled 'graphite grease' I came up with a lot of hits. Hy Heet packages the graphite grease in a smaller tube. It looked like about 4 oz size. One of the products is good down to 100 below zero to 1000 above. It is made of non-melting grease with special lubricants and graphite. Hope this helps, Jim.

You might also try one of the anti-seize formulations, many of them have graphite in them.

Try looking it up under dow corning products, I think called graphoil- generally used in high temperature valve packing seals, which are very similar to the rear main seal in a 216 engine. If Dow corning does not have it, Look for your local swagelok dealer and tell them you need to get some graphoil lubricant, they will have to do a tech service request to the factory to get it, and it will take an extra week, but they can get their hands on it. www.swagelok.com

They might be able to get it in little one time use tubes where you tear off the end.
It is good stuff

If that does not work, my local refinery(That I work with) used pure nickel special for gasket dressing, pure nickel special is the product name. It is an anti seize
I have personally used Loctite nickel anti seize in the same manner with success, I use it to dress head gaskets, exhaust gaskets, as well as the bolts and such-

I kind of ramble a lot, but I hope this helps

Go to your local FLAPS and buy some Sta-Lube MolyGraph. It comes in a bblack can or tube.

Devin