I have a 2005 I acquired recently and I'm working through all the deferred maintenance. I did a suspension inspection and an upper ball joint boot and lower control arm boot (the tie rod one, not the ball joint) are torn on the driver side rear. I've ordered OEM boots and plan to replace and regrease these soon. I also plan to inject new grease using a needle attachment into all the other (not torn) boots on the suspension and treat the outsides of the untorn boots with shin etsu silicone grease. Hopefully this will prolong them. All the control arm bushings look good.

While I'm back there with the lower ball joint separated (to inject the grease), it would be a good time to work on the CV joints if anything is needed. The car only has 27k miles, however all the OEM grease is now 17 years old. Do you guys think it's worth it to repack the inner and/or outer CV joints with new grease? Does grease "age out"?

Also, as a general question, is Redline CV-2 an appropriate grease to add to undamaged ball joints and tie rod ends? Is it compatible with the OEM grease in these locations? Can't find any data about what the OEM suspension joint grease is. There's a procedure in the service manual for swapping boots, but it doesn't say what kind of grease to use...

 

It is not a bad idea. The general consensus is that the typical inner CV cup pitting that occurs on these and some other Hondas is reduced by using different grease, especially on older vehicles. If you are pulling the balljoints apart anyways, it is pretty simple to take the cups off, clean them out and repack with grease. You do not even have to remove the axle nut to do it. Once the lower balljoint is free in the rear, you can remove the inner CV cup bolts from the diff, slide it out, take the joint apart and regrease it. It is a little less messy if you take the axle nut loose and just do it in the bench, but can be done under the car.

For the CV cups use the Redline CV2 grease. I think that is the one most have found to work best.

The outer CV joint on the rear should be fine and many never touch them. I guess it would not hurt but likely less priority than the inner CV joint.

 

Great, thanks. I actually plan to redo the propeller shaft CV joints/boots as well as mine are leaking, so looks like it'll be a CV filled weekend for me!

Good to know the outer CVs on the half shafts don't have much trouble on this car. I don't mind doing them under the car, but is the only extra step needed to get the entire halfshaft off the car to remove the axle nut? I've already had them off once to do the rear bearing TSB (regrease and retorque axle nuts +60deg), so they should come off fairly easily. Do the threads of the axle nut yield with the +60deg TSB procedure such that they shouldn't be removed/reinstalled again?

 

Yep the axle nut would be the only other step. Since you have already re-torqued them it should not be bad. It is generally recommended to replace them but I know many re-use them. I have re-used one of mine with no ill effects before. Sometimes if a previous owner did the re-tq on them (like on my car) and went crazy on it, they are a royal PITA to remove. I had to cut and chisel both of mine to break them and it sucked I was lifting the rear wheel off the ground with a 6 foot breaker bar on a 3/4inch drive socket and not even budging them. But if you have already had them off and did the re-tq correctly you should have no issues there, so likely just as easy to remove them so you can work on them on the bench.

While out it is a good time to inspect to see if they have already pitted and been swapped before for future reference. If so the pitting will be on the side that is not under load when driving forward. If the pitting occurs, the first fix is to just swap them side to side, so good to know now if that is an option in the case they start causing vibration later.

 

Why re-grease the ball joints? They shouldn't need it unless its been squeezed out or the boots were damaged.

If you do decide to do it...be careful not to use a grease meant for metal/metal sliding parts. There's a plastic bearing in there. I've had luck using "Superlube" PTFE grease or polyurea grease.

For CV axles, you want an EP grease...and yes, the redline stuff works well. Remove the axles from the car and do it on a bench. You can do it with the axles still attached, but ....why on earth would you want to?

 

Thanks for the advice. I'll purchase two new rear axle nuts and remove the whole halfshaft. They're only $5 each.

I have two types of grease on hand: Lucas Red N Tacky (lithium complex conventional) and Redline CV-2 (synthetic, moly complex I believe). Either of these suitable for our ball joints and rod ends? If not I don't mind picking up another kind. As to why, I just figured with a 17 year old car it might be worthwhile, considering how easy and cheap it is to do compared to pressing in new ball joints.

 

If you are planning on using Redline CV2 grease make sure you thoroughly clean out all the old grease, I cannot stress this enough, it is not compatible with the CV joint grease Honda uses, it will turn runny, the oil will come out of suspension. I ruined a prop shaft CV this way, learn from my mistake.

Sealed grease will not age out, as long as dirt or moisture doesn't contaminate the grease, all is good. Also, shin etsu grease is a bad idea on ball joint boots, it will allow dirt to stick to the boots. AT205 is better, and make sure you wipe it dry afterwards, clean boots make it harder for sand and stuff to stick to it. If sand/dirt sticks on the boots as the boots deform it's basically like rubbing the boot with sandpaper.

For ball joints, red and tacky will work just fine.

 

Thanks for the advice. Yes, I'll plan to disassemble the 4 CV joints completely and clean them out before repacking.

Since the OEM ball joints that are still sealed are still good, I'll just leave them alone then! For the ones that have torn boots, I'll clean them out as thoroughly as I can, but any advice on what grease to use upon reassembly? I've been looking at compatibility charts online but the problem is I don't know what the OEM grease is, so I only have half the equation. Red N Tacky is lithium complex based, and CV2 is Calcium Sulfonate based. Lithium Complex is actually compatible with everything except Polyurea, so it's the least risky if no one knows what the OEM grease is...

 

Red and tacky works just fine for ball joints.

 

I wouldn't use any moly grease (like red n tacky) for ball joints with plastic bearings.

This stuff seems really close to what OEM's use on sealed ball joints.