This post is sponsored by The Home Depot. In the past year my wife and I started working a good sized piece of land and have been raising sheep and chickens. All the ancillary activities associated with supporting and maintaining the farm has required a good deal of equipment. In the past, a manual grease gun, though awkward to use, had always been adequate for the occasional greasing that needed to be done, primarily on the small lawn tractor we used. With the substantial increase in equipment to maintain, it was clear that the handheld grease gun was as obsolete as my lazy mornings. I was therefore delighted when Home Depot provided an example of the new One+ 18v Ryobi grease guns for a test spin around the farm. Read on to find out if it’s time to take your grease gun duties cordless with this Ryobi grease gun.
Ryobi Grease Gun Specs and Features:
• Max Pressure: 10,000 PSI
• Max Flow Rate: 7.5 oz. per minute
• LED work light
• 30″ flexible hose
• Plunger rod to show how much grease is left in the tube
• Air bleeder valve
• Steel grease tube
• Pumps up to 19 grease cartridges per charge
• Warranty: 3 years
I was particularly taken with the LED work light and the 30” hose, this tool tends to do most of its work on dark hard to reach places.
Filling the Voids with the 18v Ryobi Grease Gun
I had started to experience failures on the equipment I was using. First to go was a universal joint on the PTO shaft on my 6’ brush mower, then one of the blade mandrels on the commercial mower I was using to tame the 7 acres or so of lawn started making scary noises. It was evident that despite my best efforts to keep items properly greased I was falling short of the mark. Grease is cheap when compared to the cost of replacing bearings, not even taking into account the issues downtime can create. The real barrier was delivering the appropriate amount of lubricant to where it needed to be. I didn’t always have the third hand needed to operate the lever, hold the tube and secure the tip of the hose to the fitting.
Enter the Ryobi One + 18v Grease Gun
It took me all of 5 minutes from the time the UPS driver dropped off the Ryobi grease gun to the time I had it fitted to a zerk. I was that happy to dump the old manual unit. The Ryobi was easy to load with a cartridge and I had a battery sufficiently charged. I started on the commercial mower and quickly moved through the deck to the wheels and then the suspension components. I was able to access some very difficult to reach fittings with the 30” hose. Once connected, a simple squeeze of the trigger was all it took, I observed the flow of grease out of the areas I was lubricating and moved onto the next fitting. I did struggle at times to get the coupler to release from the zerk fitting, particularly where I couldn’t get it to pull straight off the zerk. I attributed that to the newness of the coupler and the difference in zerks as at other times the coupler would slide right off when I went to disengage it. At no time did I experience the dreaded gusher of grease that accompanies a poorly fitted coupler. I would suggest that if the fittings on your equipment are old, worn or damaged to replace them with the proper fitting.
Taming the Orange Beast with the Ryobi Grease Gun
Having done a thorough job on the mower, I moved onto the tractor, a job I normally dreaded. There are grease ports on virtually every moving part of it and doing a complete lube normally requires two people with more patience than either my wife or I possess. I moved quickly from one fitting to the next and was finished in only a few minutes.
Preventing Catastrophic Failure
There are a number of implements that are powered by the power take-off (PTO) on the tractor. Aside from whatever moving parts needing lubrication, each one of these implements gets its power transferred through a shaft that has a universal joint at each end. As mentioned earlier in the post, I had one fail and come apart. Fortunately there was no other damage aside from the universal itself, which is always a possibility, but I was done brush mowing until I could replace it. With universals being $25 a pop, and the time to go get it and replace eating into a busy day, its easy to see that a little lubrication can go a long way to preventing the expense and inconvenience resulting from failures.
Conclusions
Most modern automobiles no longer have grease ports that need regular lubrication. The same is not true for most medium to large power equipment. If you have a lawn tractor or compact tractor, run any type of machinery, you need to be mindful of lubrication requirements. The larger and more complex the machine, the more likely it is to require frequent and careful lubrication. The Ryobi One + 18v grease gun is a great solution. With the 10,000 pound pressure, flexible 30” hose, LED work light and high capacity battery, I never found it to be wanting for any job around our modest farm. This One+ 18v Ryboi grease gun is available as a bare tool at the Home Depot for $119.00.
I acknowledge that The Home Depot is partnering with Home Fixated in sponsored content. As a part of the sponsorship, Home Fixated is receiving compensation for the purpose of promoting The Home Depot. All expressed opinions and experiences are our own words. This post complies with the Word Of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA) Ethics Code and applicable Federal Trade Commission guidelines.
