Front wheel bearing replacement

Blaise · Post by **Blaise** » Tue Apr 09, 2013 5:01 pm

I have a front driver side wheel bearing that is starting to rumble.

I adjusted the bearings about a year ago, so figure that it is time to change them.

They are cheap, so I plan to replace all four front bearings and the seals.

I read the article in FAQ and checked out the realoem diagram. Seems fairly straight forward.

Any tips or links appreciated.

Cheers,

Blaise

PS-funny thing is that my wheel bearings are one of the few things that was not replaced when I did all my work to the car.

BimBim2oo2 · Post by **BimBim2oo2** » Tue Apr 09, 2013 8:05 pm

The rear bearings are not the same as the front and are a tad more expensive.

I will be doing my fronts this weekend

Blaise · Post by **Blaise** » Fri Apr 12, 2013 11:42 am

I did this last night. No big deal.

Interestingly, when driving, if I slightly swerved the car back and forth, it would get louder on a right swerve and go away on a left.

That lead me to think that it was the front left bearing, since a right turn would load that bearing.

It was actually the right bearing. I guess unloading the bearing made it noisy.

The "good" side also showed signs of wear, but was not totally destroyed like the "bad" side.

Anyway, just sharing for the diagnostic part, as I thought it was interesting.

This job took me about 3 hours. Part of that time was cleaning all of the old bearings so that I could inspect them.

https://picasaweb.google.com/1030509870 ... directlink

alotawatts · Post by **alotawatts** » Fri Apr 12, 2013 4:20 pm

Nice pics !!!!!!
Thanks

GripGreg · Post by **GripGreg** » Fri Apr 12, 2013 9:11 pm

Great pics, as a matter of fact!!!
One question; did you re-pack or replace them?? It looks like a -re-pack!

OK, Another one, what format did you use to download the pics???
I want to download some pics from my Android Atrix sooo bad!!
There are no on-screen directions that I can find.
Please PM me when you have a lil time,,,,no hurry.
Thanx in advance,,,,Greg

Blaise · Post by **Blaise** » Fri Apr 12, 2013 10:16 pm

All bearings and seals are new. The old ones were trashed.

I will send you a PM regarding pics.

tschultz · Post by **tschultz** » Sat Apr 13, 2013 2:58 am

Interesting, I had the same noise (when turning right) on my e28. I suspected the drivers side, and it was indeed. Interesting yours wasn't!

The most annoying part for me was having to get the large socket and drive to take the hub apart and replace. Otherwise straightforward and quick.

Robert Bondi · Post by **Robert Bondi** » Fri Apr 19, 2013 1:31 am

I had one of my rear wheel bearings fail a few years ago. The rears are a big job.

In addition to the turning technique to diagnose which side has the offending
part, I found just spraying a little water on the wheel and wheel hub was very effective. I had water instantly vaporize off the left side and not the right. The bad bearing was creating a lot of extra friction and consequently a lot of extra heat.

Blaise · Post by **Blaise** » Fri Apr 19, 2013 11:12 am

Robert Bondi wrote: In addition to the turning technique to diagnose which side has the offending
part, I found just spraying a little water on the wheel and wheel hub was very effective. I had water instantly vaporize off the left side and not the right. The bad bearing was creating a lot of extra friction and consequently a lot of extra heat.

Good idea, thanks

Mike W. · Post by **Mike W.** » Fri Apr 19, 2013 9:14 pm

Robert Bondi wrote:I had one of my rear wheel bearings fail a few years ago. The rears are a big job.

In addition to the turning technique to diagnose which side has the offending
part, I found just spraying a little water on the wheel and wheel hub was very effective. I had water instantly vaporize off the left side and not the right. The bad bearing was creating a lot of extra friction and consequently a lot of extra heat.

Hmmm, good thought. Except as cheap as they are a lot of us even have infrared thermometers, AKA temp guns, which could be used before it got that bad. Even a 20 degree difference would be significant.

Robert Bondi · Post by **Robert Bondi** » Fri Apr 26, 2013 1:32 pm

Mike W. wrote:
Robert Bondi wrote:
Hmmm, good thought. Except as cheap as they are a lot of us even have infrared thermometers, AKA temp guns, which could be used before it got that bad. Even a 20 degree difference would be significant.
Mike,

I actually do have an IR gun. I made the water discovery somewhat by
accident while doing a little touch-up wheel cleaning.

This actually wasn't something I let go long. The bearings were only whining intermittently, so I had to do a bit of intentional driving on them just to diagnose. I remember having periods of whining off and on while driving down straight stretches of road at 40 MPH, but had trouble reproducing it in an empty parking lot while doing the turns.