Grease gun air lock?

[cmyoung2]

I have problems with grease guns losing prime, air lock, don't know the right term. They quit pumping grease even though there is plenty of grease left in the tube. one gun is a John Deere, another is an air gun from AgriSupply, but I have the problem with other guns also. Trying to purge excess air with the release does not seem to do anything, I generally end up taking the head off and forcing grease into the pickup hole, messy in the least. Guns are stored hanging upright. Has to be a better way.

 

[LouNY]

Are you using tubes of grease or bulk fills;
as I recall the sealing washer on the piston goes in different directions.
I'm thinking on the bulk fills the open end of the cup faces up into the tube and
for the tubes it faces down in the barrel.
Also is the follower spring pushing up the piston cup.
I have had to loosen the head a couple of threads sometimes especially in cold weather to get an air pocket out,
pumping the gun with the head just barely loose, it you go to far it makes a heck of a mess.

 

[fried1765]

Are you using tubes of grease or bulk fills;
as I recall the sealing washer on the piston goes in different directions.
I'm thinking on the bulk fills the open end of the cup faces up into the tube and
for the tubes it faces down in the barrel.
Also is the follower spring pushing up the piston cup.
I have had to loosen the head a couple of threads sometimes especially in cold weather to get an air pocket out,
pumping the gun with the head just barely loose, it you go to far it makes a heck of a mess.

I have such issues with my manual grease guns, but very few issues with my DeWalt gun.

 

[Cat385B]

Store the gun upside down. Even though there is a plunger on a spring in there, you are allowing gravity to pull grease away from the exit. Make sure you store spare tubes with plastic cover up, metal pop top down, for the same reason.

On the DeWalt, have you had to clean out the screen above the cartridge yet because it has trapped enough gunk that grease will not go through it?

 

[oosik]

I have occasionally had problems where the spring would not force the grease up the tube - air lock???? I open the gun - remove/reinstall the tube - screw the head back on. This has alway seemed to solve this situation. My manual guns.

I've never had this problem with my DeWalt battery grease gun.

 

[mikester]

I have problems with grease guns losing prime, air lock, don't know the right term. They quit pumping grease even though there is plenty of grease left in the tube. one gun is a John Deere, another is an air gun from AgriSupply, but I have the problem with other guns also. Trying to purge excess air with the release does not seem to do anything, I generally end up taking the head off and forcing grease into the pickup hole, messy in the least. Guns are stored hanging upright. Has to be a better way.

IMHO all manual grease guns suck.

I ended up buying a pneumatic pump that mounts on a pail of grease. Problems solved, less mess too. Now I need to figure out how to magically make the grease blobs on the barn floor disappear.

 

[dodge man]

I have such issues with my manual grease guns, but very few issues with my DeWalt gun.

Same here, that’s why I bought a battery powered DeWalt.

 

[cmyoung2]

I use tubes, not bulk. Loosening the threads doesn't seem to help much. Springs seem to work. It is an all the time problem, not just cold weather, maybe even worse in the summer, but maybe because I use it more in the summer. Thought about the upside down storage, but I'll have to change everything about the storage.

 

[Rock Crawler]

I hate my manual grease guns. They all suck, all different brands and I spend at least half of the time with them trying to get them to work. They are just horrible.

 

[Ford850]

I have a John Deere pistol grip gun that's had this same problem. I removed the bleed valve last year and found it was plugged with grease, and cleaning it helped quite a bit. But who builds a grease gun with a purge valve that is susceptible to grease? I also have an old lever gun that rarely has this issue, but I due store it hanging upside down so maybe that is the answer.