Greasing the Zerks

im kinda confused. on my 4x4 standard cab i got 3 out of the 4 zerks greased. for whatever reason, one will not take any grease. if 3 out of the 4 took the grease, it shouldnt be a problem with teh grease gun. i cleaned the hell out of the zerk fitting, it just won;t take the grease. it squirts out from the sides and just covers the outside of the zerk in grease. any ideas?

added info, the u-joints are a little more than a year old.

 

whenyou say " i cleaned the hell out of the zerk fitting" does that mean the ball is loose? it's not frozen and still won't take grease?

 

Ive not had this happen before. How do i test to see if it being frozen is an issue?

 

take a small allen key or pin or nail or similar and gently poke the ball in the middle of the zerk, sometimes they stick a little and stop grease from entering.

I like an allen key myself

keep pressing it in and out until it slides good.

 

Your aware most grease gun couplers are adjustable right?

 

If you still have a problem, NAPA or another auto shop should carry a replacment package cheap. I have to replace one or two out of fifty everytime PM our heavy equipment at work. Sometimes you just can't get them to free up.

 

You can try what uhh SKIP says, poke the ball with a pick. Then try again. You can tighten up the end of your grease gun whip.

If that doesn't work you can unscrew the zerk and clean out as much as you can and see if you can get grease through while it's out of the joint. Clean out what you can in the joint too and then see if it'll take grease. If you tighten then whip you can put more pressure into the joint and sometimes it'll blow whatever blocking, out. Just be careful not to kill yourself with exploding grease gun, you can put too much pressure on them. If not wait till it fails and replace the whole joint.

 

thanks for all of the tips. i will try poking at the zerk tomorrow. i tried adjusting the grease gun tighter, looser, didnt seem to make any difference.