Newell Gurus

Coach now goes forward and reverse without bein in neutral and being pushed.. driveline replaced.. Verified location of zerks. Will grease everything every 5000 from now on. 

Congrats! Glad the guys got u goin! Have you heard of anyone else with same issue?

No they think it was just one of those things. Had whole coach lubed just in case. Other joint did not show signs of wear. But I replaced it too

And from someone who has had his hands on it. Don't believe anyone who tells you they can check them in place. When I had u joint issues, I tried to detect play using a 36" pry bar. Nothing. However, when I disconnected the driveshaft, I could clearly feel the notch in the bearings when I moved the joint.

And so, before a wave of u joint paranoia hits, here is how early u joint problems will manifest. On a perfectly smooth highway, you can feel a subtle vibration in the floor or seats. It will vary with highway speed, and mine would only vibrate at 67 to 70 mph. Slower, no vibration, and faster no vibration. It will be more pronounced going up a slight grade. You can feel it more in the floor over the drive tires also. On our coaches the u joints are a highly stressed component, perhaps the most stressed part on the whole coach, except maybe the copilot.

Well a complete driveline spare part is being added to the stacker.. Odds of ever needing it maybe.001..

I was at Prevost Nashville earlier this week. Among other things I had the transmission end yoke and seal replaced. The tech completed the job. I took a look and saw that he reused the U Joint bolts and straps. I had to insist that they replace these components with a new strap kit! It must be the heat! Unrelated but on the topic of u joints, these are the same guys who aligned my coach and centered the steering wheel by unbolting the u-joint at the steering gear input shaft and rotating it a few splines!! A trip to Josams may be in my future!

A failing u-joint will run hotter on cap & journal that are getting ready to fail. A quick shot with a IR gun can be a good diagnostic tool. As Richard says, vibration is usually the first inkling of trouble. After feeling vibration in pick ups, I have crawled under to feel u-joint temps in an effort to find bad one. That was before I got IR gun.

Hadn't thought about the IR gun for a U-joint