Bolting up drive shaft

[Zombie Master]

O, you'll repack the bearings before fitting the pivots, won't you? I have a greasing adapter for the swing-arm bearings - great for refreshing the grease at service time - but would not miss the chance to clean and repack when the arm is off the bike.

Wouldn't I want to grease them after the pre-load is set?

[ME 109]

Nup, grease them up first. Do you know how to pack bearings by hand? Difficult to explain, but I'm sure there'll be a youtube vid to explain.
Wearing light rubber gloves makes the job easier and is of course safer for your skin.

[Zombie Master]

Nup, grease them up first. Do you know how to pack bearings by hand? Difficult to explain, but I'm sure there'll be a youtube vid to explain.
Wearing light rubber gloves makes the job easier and is of course safer for your skin.

Why would I want to remove those bearings from the swing arm at this point? I've got the tapered tip grease gun. They have always been greased. I know I am the PO!

[Airbear]

Nup, grease them up first. Do you know how to pack bearings by hand? Difficult to explain, but I'm sure there'll be a youtube vid to explain.
Wearing light rubber gloves makes the job easier and is of course safer for your skin.

Why would I want to remove those bearings from the swing arm at this point? I've got the tapered tip grease gun. They have always been greased. I know I am the PO!

Ah, typical lazy bastard PO. It happens. Now is your chance, as a caring Current Owner, to put things right. Greasing with a tapered tip grease gun attachment will squirt new grease into the bearing but it is unlikely to push out all the dirt and dried grease. Any remaining contaminants will be working against you. It doesn't take long to wash out the bearing, clean out the bearing cup inside the swing-arm and repack the bearing with nice new grease, which you can then top up with the grease gun at normal service intervals.

I'm guessing that this is currently inconvenient because of your stage of assembly. Don't sweat, mark it down for next time you have the swing-arm out.

[Zombie Master]

I used up lots of new grease pumping out the old bad stuff. All this work and the splines were just fine with molly still there after a quarter century.

[airway]

I just always use a 10mm 12 pt spanner and give 'er a really good "oomph" of torque . I don't think ft lbs or NM is that critical. Never had a problem in many times of doing it.

[bbelk]

Don't sweat, mark it down for next time you have the swing-arm out.

or 25 years, whichever comes first.