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How often should I grease caster bearings for optimal performance?
Grease casters regularly to keep them at a high level of performance.
Brand new casters or wheels offer great ergonomic benefits in most applications. In my personal experience, if someone installs a caster on their cart without doing any research, they will still typically see a minimum 40% reduction in push/pull forces. (if you are not sure what this is, please explore our videos and blogs to better understand push/pull forces on carts and how to calculate them) Achieving optimal performance from the start is easy with brand new casters. The real challenge is maintaining older casters through regular maintenance like greasing to keep them at a high level of performance.
A maintenance schedule does not follow a standard process across all applications. Each application is liable to a different duty cycle (how long you’re using the casters in a work day) and weight. Other things to consider are whether the cart the casters are on has any regular washing requirements. If so, what chemicals will the casters be around? Depending on the wash and the chemicals used, you may have to grease the casters and wheels after each wash. This would also apply if the casters were to get fully submerged in water for any amount of time. Please make sure to discuss with a rep if you will be regularly washing your carts.
Maintenance Schedules
- In a working environment that requires using the casters 18-24 hours per day, 7 days a week, you will want to grease at least once per month.
- In applications where the casters are in use for a couple of hours a day each day, you would want to make sure you are maintaining the casters every 3-4 months
- For carts moving larger machinery on and off during a week or even a month, you could go 6 months between a maintenance check. It is important to note that Heavy Duty Applications, starting around the 5,000LBS mark, should use Lubriplate No. 1444.
This grease comes standard in Caster Concepts casters, starting with the 80 Series and higher. For all casters 80 Series and below, we use Mystic LT200 Low Temp grease. Those are the two standard options at Caster Concepts, but alternatives can be used upon request or dictated by the application’s environment.
When selecting a grease, consider the caster load, runtime duration, and any temperature variations. Applying grease to friction points within the wheel hub and the leg surfaces of roller bearings helps reduce drag and improve longevity. For further information on your maintenance schedule, please feel free to consult a rep for help.
Maintenance Free Options
Not all casters and wheels need to have a maintenance schedule. If casters fail for you due to lack of maintenance, you should consider a maintenance-free caster. This caster style comes with a completely sealed swivel section and precision ball bearings in the wheel. However, some applications don’t allow for a maintenance-free caster due to the extreme environment or extreme application conditions. In these cases, a maintenance-free caster might not help achieve the best performance.
