TESTED! RC Bearings | Standard | Stainless | Ceramic 

A dry bearing will almost always spin longer than a greased bearing that is not under pressure or under load. A very lite oil will usually help it spin longer but again not under pressure. Most bearings are engineered for specific use. The grease or lube inside can be very specific. A bearing that spins great on your test may seize up at 95mph due to inadequate cushioning of lubricant to the metal bearing causing the bearing to heat up and seize. Sometimes the tests we do seem to contradict what is commonly known about things but sometimes we are just not taking in all the factors of what a product was designed for. As you mentioned you probably wouldn’t put ceramic bearings in your brasher but they may be necessary in a Rc drag car. Thanks for sharing your experiment.👍

Nice video, did learn alot. I did some testing on my Traxxis Slash bearings a few days ago. I pulled out original wheel bearings and spun them. (just used finger) They started at about 40 seconds. After cleaning with a bearing blaster and oiling, I got like 1 min and 31 seconds. You put a bead of oil around the bearing. I think that may have been too much. I watched another video and they put a single drop of oil. I added 2 drops and then worked it in. I would love to hear what others have to say! PS. After hearing about my test, my son running Associated B-Mod decided to clean all 8 wheel bearings. His car went faster as the night went on and he won his A-Main on the dirt track

Dude, I tip my hat off to you! This was an incredible informative video. Thanks for taking the time to perform this test & posting your honest findings. I just replaced my rear bearings on my Traxxas Rustler 2WD that I have setup for speed runs after loosing one of the bearings due to a crash after snapping a driveshaft axel at 84mph. I noticed that the Fast Eddy ceramic bearings I had were all shot grinding pretty bad, which may have contributed to snap my MIP steel axel due to high heat caused by friction. These bearings not being so old & not too many runs on them made me curious so I removed the rubber seals. Not sure if the ceramic bearings are supposed to be different in color, but they look like regular bearings to me. Did you notice a color difference between the ceramic & non ceramic, I'm curious. Thanks again for the great video 👍👍

I normally put bearings in rotation, meaning that I use my older bearings for bashing, and get new bearings for race/ on road use. Great content, keep it up!!

Fascinating to watch on a cold rainy day :)

Never really thought about it. I put ceramic from Fast Eddy Bearings into the GF-01CB build I did. Other than that the most bearings I would use were for my snowmobile. For the drift use what runs the longest!

Great topic and interesting results.

Thanks for sharing. I'm currently running ceramic bearings with metal shields from AvidRC (cleaned and re-lubed) in my entire kits and that thing slides like a wet baby seal.

Just found this getting into Drifting love the body’s of the cars and upgrades. This bearing test blew my mind. Thank you

Great experiment! Looks like it too a while to do it all 👌 I run the hybrid style bearings. Rubber shield on the outside, metal shield on the inside. Helps keep dirt out and also give a little more free rotation. I also hit my bearings with some PTFE spray once in a while. That's it. Just bashing so when one goes out I replace it 😃

I can’t wait to do this on my sons 1/10 Touring Car. I’ll be using ceramic bearings on the drive train and wheels to free everything up. I’ll be using 1up bearing oil.

This is a very huge topic, nice to see someone goes neutral on it, but i can assure you, once the Ceramic Bearings are broken in (approx 20 Lipo Packs) they will get better and better and better. Would love to see a follow up video on this :-) Nice Work, loved the Video :-)

what! only 2k views! this guy deserves in the hundred thousands

The difference in spinning time is due to the rubber SEALS having a slight bit of drag against the inner race. Shielded bearings have a small clearance between the shield and the inner race. Testing like this will never show much of a difference between steel bearings and hybrid ceramics if they have the same clearance, lube and ball retainer specs. Where the difference comes in is under a load. The difference you are seeing between the out of the package and cleaned is likely due to most small bearings being packed with a light grease. All that said, I bet that if you ran a real world test, like a controlled drag race, you would not see any statistical difference between them.

Another brilliant tech video nice to see your results does just prove time spent prepping. Makes a massive difference . And as others have commented the ceramics will get better with use and will last sooo much longer and perform more consistently .

toughness is more important to me i just drive them in the yard was wandering if Ceramic Si3N4 Bearing were any good or worce in term of lasting say in the wheel or differential

I installed my Reve d knuckle SG with Reve d front axle. But there’s a little play left and right. I put the bearings that came from knuckle. Should I put 5x10x4 or 5x10x3 ? And it said put 1 mm spacer what kind of spacer is it? Thanks

Dude great video! Exactly what I was looking for and way more detail than expected. I have a MAXX so I’ll probably use stainless balls and metal seal. Clean and lube them as needed. Thanks!!

Hey Yeah Racing sells a PTFE RC bearing kit for Mst Rmx 2.0 you might want to check them out. I just ordered a set for my car. I'll give you an update on after the install

I put WHITZ ceramic bearings in my DR10, just the other night. I was amazed, giving the front wheel a good spin, it went for 2.44 seconds, no treatment, no doubt this is spinning much free'er than the stock..but yes, probably not the bearing for heavy bashing.

Was looking at bearings, primarily ceramic bearings to see if they are all that over at BocaBearings, and they indicate that their ceramic bearings have a short break-in time before they fully loosen up. Might want to put them back in your car, make a couple of laps around your track, then try the measurements again. Would be interesting to see if that makes a difference.

I use rear end fluid for all my bearings since my 92 silverado leaks rear end fluid, I always have some on standby lol, normally have them sit in the oil for at least an hour or so. But I bash and put around, I don't need a ton of wheel speed just want them to last.

If you want to also try if-ws2 and graphene are couple good ones. Of course zinc and graphite ptfe and moly.

The bearing ball type doesn't matter much at the speeds the gearbox speeds (matters formotor shaft speeds however). Majority of the bearing friction is from the seal and retainer if the lubricant type and amount are correct. But most cheap OEMs don't do the lubrication correctly. Your results pretty much back this up. Note: You should test the bearing with actual load against the inner and outer race.

I know its late but what makes the ceramic better vs metal ball bearing is the hardness. Ceramic is able to basicly crush small dirt and debris and basicly polish itself. Metal slowly gets grimey and clogged up. So long term it is better but not speed wise. Rubber seals also slow things down.

Nice video and info. shame you didn't have the stainless and ceramic with metal shields, rubber shielded never spins as well as metal, but are far better for keeping dust and dirt out

Great general video! You by the way put wwaaaay too much oil in the bearings. Bearings should just get a little drop of oil from one side and not more, spin it around and job done. You overoiled them which lead to the problem that they didn't spin very long. Overoiled bearings will collect lots of dust and dirt while being on the track which will decrease the performance very fast. To clean them I would recommend to use break cleaner and a bearing cleaner container. The bearing cleaning container has a metal container with tiny holes that is a kind of hovering over the bottom of the container where the dirt falls through and lands on the bottom of the container. This way the dirt is falling down and the bearing is not directly laying in the dirt.

need to say that i seen pro drivers running touring cars that remove the rubber shield and clean bearings mount them unshielded in the car and make a light oiling and between the runs blow the bearings clean with compressed air and re oil them again, everything to gain a tiny amount of less drag on the cars.

Thanx for vid (originally lookin at ceramic knife bearings but learned alot here).

The only time I worry about bearings is in race cars. My bashers meh. As long as they have the rubber shield I'm fine.

Good knowledge being shared here. Thanks buddy

Thank you I learned a lot

You have 1 flaw with this test. When putting that weight around tire to spin wheel are you doing same pressure every time? Tighter wrap = longer spin Not as tight = less spin

In my off-road buggies I run rubber sealed bearings with original grease on anything that's exposed to the elements. We race outdoors in all weathers and I run a 6.5 in my 2wd and 5.5 in my 4wd. The bearing drag makes no difference to motors that powerful, I just don't want my bearings disintegrating!

With longer spin time only means that the seal is worn out yes it will spin longer but after awhile dirt will get in and slow them down if on carpet or road course wore out seals are just fine

when i do rubber-sealed bearings , i take the rubber off one side clean them, and don't even attempt to put them back on - just run the open side away from the dirt.

Which bearings do you use on your Traxxas X-Maxx 8S? So from your video the full metal ones are the best? Is that correct as I am rebuilding 2 X-Maxx 8S monsters at this time and need new bearings for both.

What if you race 5 to 6 min races, light oil then air pressure the extra oil out. would they seize up? Re-lube after each race

Nice! Cleaning is most important and so is oiling. Would u recommend just rubber sealed stainless steel bearing for dirt ff road? For durability and resistance to dirt?

lubricated bearings wont spin as long free wheeling but wont overheat and disintegrate like a dry bearing will

Any bearing reccomendations for my e revo 2.0? Traxxas sells em for 4x the price they would be in the fast eddy bearing kit but I’m not sure how good fast eddy is vs stock... any words of advice would be greatly appreciated (:

Hi, the durability of this type of hub with ceramic bearings is compromised by cyclists weighing over 100lbs?

I run nitro on road mostly in a parking lot or in front of my house doing a couple passes I wanna run track so I would use metal bearings but if it's really dusty and a lot of dirt might stick to rubber

Really good quality video 👍🏻. I’m new to this hobby. I do only bashing with my granite so I use rubber seal bearing. But I have a question for you for my motor which bearing should I use ? cuz I know rubber is not recommend for the motor. Thanks

A really interesting experiment with different bearings *totally full watched 👍Au 👍giving you a big like*

For a No Prep drag car that only runs a couple seconds at a time I’m wondering if oil is even needed 🤔

Excellent video and info. Thank you

For RWD drift cars it's imperative the front wheels spin freely. Overdose Low Friction Bearings are amazing. I shake them in a pill bottle with Isopropol Alcohol to clean and lube them with a drop or 2 of 1Up Racing Clear Bearing Oil 120202. I can flick the front wheel with my finger and it will spin for 90 seconds.

could you do a video how to maintain an rc car (what to clean and oil/grease) and how to clean the bearings also? i usually just clean the dirt off the car (i havent touched the bearings at all), and dont oil it, and sometimes i clean the motor under tap water (i take it off the car), the car is a normal touring/drift car which i drive on a dirt road

Good topic. Nice findings.

If you are into this topic as much as I am, I hope you teach Oval Rc’s video on how to reduce drag from your bearings for stock oval racing with traxxas mud boss racing stock class regulations. His video set me on a mission about bearing drag.

Take one shield off and throw it away. leave the other one alone. you can clean the bearing this way and still have the benefit of a shielded bearing protecting from FOD... Install thee bearing with the shield facing out.

Thank You definitely interesting and saved me some money.

I wonder how well the ceramic bearing would spin without oil? :)

Great video for controlled test. Just be mindful free spinning isn’t a good way to judge rc bearings as high speed grease for the high speed bearings is actually thick and will have less viscosity as the temp goes up. Free spin is good for skate bearing test. For a good rc bearing test, need the bearings to be sprung up at operating rpm for x min and then check for spin down time.

Very interesting ...!

Great video! Long story short ... Jim's top end ceramic bearings worse than amazon cheapo steel bearings.

So informative was disappointed with the ceramics at 1st but they got there in the end when the lube was nicely spread evenly. I am interested to see what ceramic would of done just cleaned and no lube though.

Good video

great info and video

All people sell online for xmaxx and other rc is abec5 which is only about half decent you want to measure all your bearing sizes and order abec9 which is the best quality and tightest tolerance you can get if you measure your bearings you can order them by size in abec9 from Japan and have awesome bearings and also rubber shielded and steel and ceramic doesn't matter if it's only abec5 that's what people can make the most money on because people don't understand the tolerance and manufacturing grades behind bearings. People just get those cheap abec5 grade bearings in bulk from China and make "kits" for rc and make a good profit. If you measure your bearings yourself outer and inner race diameter and order abec9 you will have life long bearings.

Bearing grease is designed to go soft and even go liquid under load, so testing cold bearings has really very little sense to it. By design, bearing grease isn't where its supposed to be out of the box, only when bearing runs. I'd say stainless, fully sealed for bashers and crawlers prolly has most sense-not thinking about the drag.

Good video idea

All rubber seals eventually make contact and drag. I take them all out of spool bearings of my fishing reels.

You might be over tightening the tire, putting stress on the bearing. That happens to my bmx bike when pedals are too tight

Looking on Boca's website, their ceramic bearings say... "Bearings that are packed in grease will require a short break in period to loosen up."

I have raced dirt & carpet, drive scalers, crawlers, and fly for 30 years. You absolutely will not find better bearings than Acer Racing. You can pop the seals, spin them in PB Blaster, re-lube and get upwards of 10 uses out of them. Absolutely none of the other brands held up to more than 2-6 re-packs max depending on the application. Boca, Jim's, Avid.. nothing has been more durable. Rubber shield Abec 3 for outdoor, rubber shield Abec 5 for indoor. This comes from 30 yrs experience, not opinion or friend favoritism. I'm not saying your brand choice is biased, but rolling resistance of new compared to having 10-30 packs through them is huge. Acer was consistently the least crunchy during outdoor dirt short course racing which was the most punishing to all of the brands I tested. Avid was consistently the worst for staying clean and smooth. Just for reference, I would run different brands on all 4 wheels, then both fronts would match, and rears would be different.. then I'd swap it all around. At times one end of the track would be wet mud and the rest of the track would be dry dust and gritty, so it would stick. I wasn't easy on them lol. Carpet was surprisingly dirty, carpet was tested in various carbon chassis pan cars with Abec 5 and 1 drop of purple Acer SIN lube. I have virtually the same results in crawler/scalers as outdoor dirt racing.

Nanotech Industrial Solutions shows the nano sized difference in timken bearing tests. I also like insitu graphene from Dr. Richard Shankman

VERY INTERESTING BROTHER 😀🤙🤙🤙🤙🤙🤙🤙

WHAT WAS THE PRICE DIFFERENCE IN ALL THOSE SETS????? 🤙🤙🤙

What is the weight difference?

I understand what your trying to do but all that is irrelevant if the bearing is not operating under a load the spin time is night and day to just a free spin vs spinning with weight on them

Very nice test!

You don't need to lube ceramic bearings and without lube they run much longer with much less drag.

Don't ad so much bearing oil.. You only need a small 2 drops in those

' metal ball bearing is a better run than nylon bearing

The results did show a pattern in all cases that showed and improvement (in a no load situation) of all bearings after cleaning and oiling. Where I think your methods of testing are not suitable is the way you spin the wheel and the results not an accurate representation of the real world application. First, the weight was attached to what seemed to be a nylon ribbon, this was not gripping the plastic drift wheel so impossible to say you put a repeatable force into the wheels for each test. The second issue is you are testing the bearing under no load which is not how they will be used on the car. The different type of bearings will work differently when put under load. This is where I believe the ceramic bearings will make an improvement over steel ones. But it's all very interesting regardless

If you just drive them when new they break in.

For RC and the environments we run in, the SS or Rubber sealed bearing are the best. Metal Shielded bearing are not really shielded. The behave the way they do because they have a "break in" time. It takes a heat cycle or twenty to get all the small bearing balls supporting the weight evenly. The way you were lubricating the SS bearing was also the most inefficient way you can do it. You have to actually use a Vacuum chamber to get SS bearings to absorb any oil. (You can buy a vacuum pump at HF dirt cheap) Once the oil is in there it takes some time and spinning for the oil to distribute and space out the balls evenly. Ceramic bearings are not optimal in an environment where they are not sitting in a complete bath of liquid, their life expectancy and staying cool depends on them being completely bathed, that is why they excel in those environments. Rubber sealed bearings are best in basher environments where DIRT will absolutely get in, like mudding with an RC truck, on the wheels and outside diff housing. If you need the info on using a vacuum pump or hot water to pack bearings full of oil let me know.

If you want the wheels to spin longer balance the wheels !!! It will make a difference.

if you use in real car or motorcycle full Ceramic bearing is the key, if you just clean and remove the lube from the steel bearing and put in a real car or motorcycle you will be in great trouble

Who would have thunk?

Rubber, america or australian steel.

Nice fart hahahahaha I heard that fart buddy

way to much oil was put back in

Put less oil in

Alcohol works better

NSK - koyo - nachai - NTN - skf (Sweden) these are the best bearings I know mostly from Japan