ive been using a new throw for about a few weeks now and ive put in at least 2 hours every day with it. with that said the bearing in the yoyo has started to spin for shorter amounts of time. i dont have any bearing lube atm so would it be okay to use wd-40?
No never use it.
Just buy Yoyojam lube
nope that is some of the worst kind of stuff into a Yoyo.
If you have trumpet valve oil, (make sure it’s really thin) sewing machine oil (my personal favorite can get the stuff cheap and it works good from my experiences)clipper oil, or house oil I have heard works If you have any of that laying around in your home. But DO NOT PUT WD-40 IN YOUR BEARING IT WILL RUIN IT!!!
house oil?? what do you mean by that
I think 3-in-1 household oil is what is being brought up.
whatever oil you use, stick with non-petroleum based products (aka natural stuff) if you can… some of the others can degrade plastics over time and just aren’t generally good for you either.
YYJ oil is 100% natural, non-toxic, totally safe… it’s actually even edible (WARNING: IT TASTES HORRIBLE… don’t ask)
Kyle
Lube will shorten spin times. If it is responsive and gritty, clean it. Otherwise, don’t worry about it. Lube is essentially used to quiet bearings. WD40 will gunk it up.
Use lighter fluid instead to clean the bearing then use thin lube for unresponsive play
Just to set the record straight, WD-40 will NOT harm your bearing, and most likely have no effect on the plastics used in yoyos. You shouldn’t be putting it on the plastic in any event.
Umm, if any of you had actually tried it before, you would no that WD-40 does indeed work. It’s thicker than the other lubes, and most definitely WILL NOT harm your bearing.
Wd40 is not lube it just cleans the bearings
False, it is both.
No it isn’t. It was never designed to clean or lube anything. It’s a rust remover/preventative and a moisture repellant. Even the company themselves says quite clearly that it isn’t designed to be used as a lubricant.
It is long proven that over time, under high speed especially, it breaks down and turns to basically gooey gunk. Again, this isn’t speculation, it’s information directly from the source… people have been trying to use it as a bearing lube in everything from yoyos to skateboards, skates, etc. for years.
In the short term, no it won’t cause any ‘harm’… but you’ll have to clean it out to remove it when it breaks down, which can be rather difficult.
That said, it actually does make a good cutting oil for aluminum… but that’s hardly related to using it as a bearing lube.
Kyle
I seriously doubt most people throw hard enough to generate the RPMs that tend to break down WD-40.
Hmm, here’s a quote from wiki. It may not be 100% accurate, but I expect it’s more than correct enough for my purposes.
"Formulation
WD-40’s formula is a trade secret. The product was not patented in 1953 to avoid disclosing the details of its composition; the window of opportunity for patenting the product has long since closed.[4][7] WD-40’s main ingredients, according to U.S. Material Safety Data Sheet information, are:
50% Stoddard solvent (In 1953 this was the predominant cleaning fluid used by dry cleaners.)
25% liquefied petroleum gas (presumably as a propellant; carbon dioxide is now used instead to reduce WD-40's considerable flammability)
15+% mineral oil (light lubricating oil)
10-% inert ingredients
The German version of the mandatory EU safety sheet lists the following safety-relevant ingredients:
60–80% heavy naphtha (a petroleum product used e.g. in wick type cigarette lighters), hydrogen treated
1–5% carbon dioxide"
Proving my point that it is both solvent and lubricant. According to the above, it is 50% Mineral Spirits and 15% Mineral Oil.
It actually doesn’t take much… few thousand RPM is plenty.
My information came from talking to one of their product guys. They’ve also stated this in various articles over the years about skate bearings.
They also make a product specifically for lubrication called WD40 Bike I believe… designed to be a long term lubricant.
Yes, it does have lubricants in it, that doesn’t make it good for bearings… it also has a lot of other junk in it.
And yes “WD-40 does indeed have 50% mineral spirits, but they are refined and purified for specific characteristics needed to meet today’s performance, regulatory, and safety requirements.” which means they aren’t comparable to what you’d say, clean a bearing with.
Anyway, everybody is welcome to do whatever they want with their bearings and your own experience may vary of course… but I’d -highly- recommend sticking with something actually designed to do what you’re asking of it… it’s not like it’s expensive to just buy the right product for the job.
Kyle
@OP
Lubeing the bearing does not make it spin faster, you need to clean it.
If you don’t have access to these sort of things, you might as well clean your bearing in regular rubbing alcohol, and dry it out really well. It works well for me this way
x2. If I were you, I would just give it a really good cleaning in lighter fluid, or whatever else you prefer to use, and just play it dry. If you got a OD 10ball bearing, it still sounds really quiet when playing dry. Let use know what you end up doing and what happened.
Wd-40 should only be used for flamethrowers…bwahahahah!