ymz
Top Post Dawg
- Joined
- May 12, 2003
- Location
- Between Toronto & Montreal
- TDI
- 2003 Jetta TDI Wagon, 2003 Jetta TDI Wagon
Years of training...I don't know how they could have done that.
Yuri
Years of training...I don't know how they could have done that.
I've got two front wheel bearings on a MKIV GTI that I can't get out with my slide hammer. I hit the passenger side more than 200 times, as hard as I could. My roomate took a crack at it for a few minutes. What sort of shops have a press that would remove these bearings from their spindles? I seriously can't keep banging on the wheel bearing like this... it's exhausting... ! Can these things weld themselves in to the point where you have to replace the whole spindle?
Well the washers I chose are the right size, it worked eventually on the driver's side but the passenger is still suck after repeated heat cycles and many many very strong whacks. I even got a friend to help, we took turns hitting it as hard as possible... One of us would hold the hammer in place, the other would use both hands on the weight. Damn thing won't budge. It was driven on repeatedly as it was going bad, must have formed a pretty good bond with the knuckle!!
Oh and I don't have pictures of my biceps handy, but I am a pretty strong rock climber...
Thanks Ed... this car has 180K on it and the bearing had been making some noise for a while now... I think this bearing is more stuck than normal.Hey bro, sorry to hear the trouble you are having. I did both mine couple months ago. What´s wierd is usualy pulling out the hub part with the slide hammer is the easy part. The inner race comes off stuck to the hub and the outer race stays behind in the knuckle. In your case it sounds like you cant even get the hub off. I guess if nothing works I would take the knuckle off and take it to someone who has a press. (I actually had to do that one my first one, coz I busted the harbor freight tool. Later got the nut welded back on). I had to disconnect the tie rod end and the lower control arm to remove the knuckle from the strut. Mark the position of the lower control arm on the bolts (spray paint) and the number of threads the of the tie rod on the steering side. I actually could not get the lower tie rod nut off so had to grind it off and buy a new one. ~$20 Moog.
I was heating the hub with a torch, the hub is frozen on the inner race. So, heating the hub helps it change size slightly which might just help me get it out. I was having no success on the driver's side until I used heat, and it eventually gave up with heat. So, with my extremely limited experience, I would say that the heat was helpful in this case.What exactly were you heating? The hub? The knuckle???
There is no bond with the knuckle that you are breaking at this
stage of the operation. You are trying to just rip out the inner race--
heating the knuckle isn't going to buy you anything.
Much ado over nothing... I left the driver's side soaking in a rust breaker last night and it came of in 20 hits this morning!!!
Oh man, I never imagined how much it was going to fight...Next, you get to remove the remainder of the bearing, and it's gonna fight you every step of the way.
Well, not exactly. I broke my Harbor Freight bearing puller trying to get the bearing out!! It took about 3 minutes of impact-hammering to bust the pin and threads out of/off off the nut off the big honkin' HF bolt included in the bearing puller kit. Check this out...Congratulations. Hopefully that was your only requisite
homage to Murphy for the job.
Thanks! I didn't keep my receipt, but it's no problem because I just took the broken bolt to the machine shop along with my steering knuckles. They said welding it might make it brittle but they could make me a new one... so my HF bearing puller should be even stronger than ever with a new, properly welded nut.Looks like you got the 'newer' version of the HF tool... hope you kept your receipt. Also doesn't sound like a great time with that GTI, you have my sympathies.
I'm not sure, but now that the knuckles are off the car and I can see them in good lighting conditions, I may have discovered that I did something wrong in the procedure by choosing a disk that is too big to fit through the back side of the knuckle. I was sure the disk I had chosen was smaller than the bearing itself, but it looks as though it may not have cleared the lip on the backside of the knuckle. Anyway... I'll "post a fix" when I'm sure I know what went wrong...I suppose it would be worth a writeup on how to use a hydraulic press to remove the bearings if/when the on-the-car method does not work. I resorted to that method for my first wheel bearing as we didn't have a slide hammer, and it worked well... if you've got a press.
Ditto, I think the 'newer' version is welded and pinned... but not as well. I've now got a stick welder so should mine ever come apart, I'll dress everything with a grinder and weld it back together. But I haven't had to redo a wheel bearing; everything seems okie dokie smokie with both sides since they were done.On mine, that nut is welded on.
D'oh!I'm not sure, but now that the knuckles are off the car and I can see them in good lighting conditions, I may have discovered that I did something wrong in the procedure by choosing a disk that is too big to fit through the back side of the knuckle.
Sure is, and it sucks to do one side only to find out it's actually the other one that's bad. Put it up on jackstands in 5th gear; you'll be able to tell what bearing's gone bad pretty quickly.It's really, really hard to figure out which bearing to replace
This job seems highly variable. Mine wasn't too bad, yours doesn't sound too bad. Plenty of other folks have had a horrible time of it. I'd rather prepare you for the worst and let you be pleasantly surprised.1. Not a bad job if you have all the right tools. I think this write-up actually makes it seem like more of a b*tch than it is, but maybe I got lucky.
Probably. It was for the balljoint nut plate, not for the wheel bearing. Balljoints on my car are still tight.5. Small point, but the estimate that 25 Nm is close to 20 Nm + 1/4 a turn for the wheel bearing is well off.
Holy cow! The axle nut is present and tight? *** did that shop do? Let us know what you find...Well I guess ill be doing my wheel bearings tomorrow using these how-to's.
For me it was real easy for me to figure out wich side it was.
Bad Wheel Bearing <<Youtube video
Hey man I'm moving to Flint, so I'm up there all the time recently. (going back to school at Kettering) If you need a hand with that write me a PM and I'll bring my tools up there ASAP. Good luck!Well I guess ill be doing my wheel bearings tomorrow using these how-to's.
For me it was real easy for me to figure out wich side it was.
Bad Wheel Bearing <<Youtube video