Dreaded King Pins..

7 or 10 year warranty,depending on where/how it cracked.

 

I called Freightliner.

72 month/750,000 miles.

I have 759,000 miles on it. and it was put into service in 11/06.

So out on both ways.

 

If it isn't cracked from a wallowed out bolt hole or loose bracket i'd put up a real fight.

 

You can see the thin spot in the rail flange.

The crack runs right down the middle of it.

 

The old manual says that they need to be done on the ground. That was a revision in 8/2006, when they thought that it would be OK. It led to more failures and the 10/2011 revision went back to jack up. The new (really back to old) way is copied/pasted below. We just had a training class on this and got the newer manuals. Eaton says that it's OK to do it on the ground, but if the grease is hard going in to jack it up to improve grease flow to flush out contamination.

1.Raise the vehicle until the tires leave the
ground. The tires must be suspended when
the king pins are lubricated. Place the vehicle
on stands. Place shims in front and back of the
rear wheels to keep the vehicle from moving.
2.Lubricate the king pins through the upper and
lower greasers (grease zerks) at the side of
the stub axle. Figure 13.
3.Apply lubricant until the new lubricant passes
between the upper shim pack and the seal.
4.Lower the vehicle until the wheels touch the
ground.

If you have newer info than that, I'd like to know. Things change all the time and I could be wrong. Even when they said not to jack them up, we still did. We have very few king pin issues and don't want to change what works. Our application is hauling cars, so we have more front axle loading than typical trucks.

 

I do on my trucks what it says in the factory service manuals, for those trucks, what to do. Even if my truck was built in 1983 and I happen to have the original manual. BTW, the last time I did kingpins was in 2001 and they are still tight.

 

I wasn't trying to start an argument and meant no disrespect. My opinion differs from yours, that's all. My opinion is to follow the most current service manual, which you said was wrong. I'm not saying that you are wrong, but if your using a 1983 manual, you may be out of date. What ever parts you are replacing may (probably) have been through several design changes and have different instructions. Repair manual revisions are so common these days that paper manuals are slowly being phased out in favor of online subscriptions.

I have never changed the same kingpin twice. The last ones I did were on one of our own trucks was on a 96 FLD, they were original and had 1.4 million on them. Most of the kingpins I have done, were on trucks that we don't normally service. The owners don't do good services. The ones that I've done on trucks that our shop does service regularly have all exceeded any normal life expectancy.

 

Hendrickson Airtek, supposed to be loaded.