I finally got some time this weekend to try and grease my u joints and slip yokes, as well as my ball joints. So I got two grease guns, loaded them with regular and moly lithium grease and went to work. But I have a few questions from the process.

So first I started on the rear drive shaft. Took me a minute to realize only the extra cab pickups have the double cardan joint. Then noticed the PO had replaced the greaseable u joints with the sealed types. Any opinions on whether I should swap them out if I'm removing the drive shaft anyway? You may be asking why I'm removing the driveshaft anyway. Well, so I hook up my gun to the slip yoke zerk. I put a pump in, thinking oh man! Good bye driveline clunk! Wait, why is grease coming right out of the driveshaft? Clean out the grease, stick my finger in there and immediately touch the rear of the zerk. There's nothing inside my drive shift! How big of a problem is this????

The front shaft went fine. It must have been pretty dry. I pumped in grease until I was able to see the yoke expanding. I stopped pretty soon, I wasn't sure how much to add. Any advice?

So now it's time for my ball joint disaster. One I couldn't even get any grease into. It just kept shooting out the fill nozzle. Not sure what I'm doing wrong? The other boot seemed to leak under the bottom Second, the boots were completely empty, so I guess I'll just replace them when it's warmer.

Sigh, previous owners.....

 

There should be a cap at the end of driveline. They do seem to pop off and no separate part number is available for them, AFAIK, from Toyota. The thread above gives a couple of ideas how to fix.

It sounds like you may have some plugged zerks......try depressing the ball at the end on the zerk with the tip of a small screw driver to free it up so the zerk will accept the grease.

 

Also, make sure you're STRAIGHT ON the zerk or is WILL pump out the side.

 

I have never had any luck with clearing clogged grease zerks.

I just replace them

The factory joints are the ones that don`t have grease fitting on all the original ones I have seen.

 

Great advise

 

My FSMs all indicate the u joints are the greaseable types, so I assumed those were factory. Honestly I'd be happier if they were newer because at least there was some service done I'll replace them anyway, they're fairly cheap. Replacing them seems terribly fun, but I replaced the wheel bearings recently so everything should be relatively broken loose

I had the thought they might be clogged. I used a pick and tried to poke it in there. No luck I thought maybe it was my nozzle but I swapped and still no luck.

I checked out that thread but mostly the advice seemed to be take it to a driveline shop. I guess the driveshaft is in perfectly good condition otherwise so I'll try and find a place and see what they quote me.

 

I have a place here that can change u-joints lots faster then me at a fair price.

I just pull the drive shaft and drop it off.

 

What is a fair price? I've never had this kind of work done and the guy refused to even give me a ball park over the phone. I don't really have an issue taking it there, except I won't be able to do that for a while and my truck is my DD. He advised me to not worry about it since it's not making any serious noises, so I think he just didn't want to get locked into a number.

I understand that mentality, I just don't like it

 

OEM has zerk fittings...

 

x2 on what snobdds said...my 88 and 94 4Runners all had greasable ujoints front and rear.

You can also think about this tool. One day I will buy it....spend a little money to prevent alot of stress. Makes it worth it to me because who hasn't fought a clogged zerk fitting....