Front wheel bearings shot - try DIY or take it in?

Hey Steve, If you're talking about using the outer race of an old bearing race to help drive the new bearing into it's fully seated position, there's no need to grind it down at all. Like I show in the Part 2 video I made for this job, you first drive the bearing in most of the way with a small 1/2" press plate. Once the plate bottoms out on the face of the knuckle, you finish the pressing with the old race. The reason why there is no need to grind down the old outer race is because there is a relief in the beginning of the bore of the knuckle. The old race will not get stuck in the bore of the knuckle when used to press the new bearing into it's fully seated position.

 

Thanks for that Timmah!

I made a little progress last night - finally got all the tools and parts in, bought and assembled a 20 ton HF press along with some plates from the local ironworks. $10 each for 1/2 inch steel plates cut to 4x10. They didn't have my order ready when I showed up so I got to watch them cut them. It was pretty awesome really - never seen this done before. 2 guys took a huge piece of stock and walked it over to a conveyor where it was fed into a giant sheer. And just like a pair of scissors to a piece of paper - snip! Easy. Took 'em maybe 90 seconds to spit these out. I wound up going to Dencol if anyone local is doing this. Great bunch of guys over there. I had zero luck with any of the local machine & fab shops, but the last one I talked to told me about Dencol which is a series of steel warehouses with seemingly anything you could ask for in steel. They have a crazy amount of stuff in stock and they're great to work with.

Stopped last night after getting as far as I could. My rotor is stuck on and wouldn't budge so I decided it was enough at about 9 pm - will try again this morning. I'm a little further along than I wanted to be at this point though so so far so good! The goal today is get the right side completely done. We'll see.

 

After applying a bit of heat to the rotor it came right off. A few more bolts & pressing out the upper ball joint and voila!



Not entirely what I expected to find though. There's a ring holding the ABS ring on that I can't figure out how to remove. There's nowhere to grab it and it turns freely. I even got under it with a seal puller and it won't budge. I was expecting the lock nut here, but nope - just a ring that spins freely & I can't get off. The repair manual doesn't address this as far as I can find.

Time for lunch I guess and do some more reading. It's looking pretty unlikely that I'll meet my goal of finishing this today now, but oh well. For the good news - the wheel bearing is definitely the culprit. When I was spinning the hub with the axle still attached it got me thinking the issue was in my differential. However that was just the axle transferring the vibration upstream. The axle is silky smooth with the hub off. The hub sounds & feels like it has gravel in it.

 

Hey Rob, watch the Part 2 video because I cover all this. That ring on top of the ABS sensor is the bearing spacer. You don't need to remove that or the ABS sensor first. You just grab a press sleeve that has a narrower diameter than the bearing spacer but one that's a little narrower than the outside diameter of the hub spindle so your press sleeve doesn't get stuck in the inner race of the bearing. When you press out the hub from the bearing, you free the ABS sensor and bearing spacer at the same time.

 

That's what I was just starting to think, but didn't want to start putting pressure on it without being sure. Seems like I recall the part in the video about that as you caution to note its orientation. Gonna give those another go - thanks again Timmah!

 

Sure enough - that's what I get for trying to go by the manual. Timmah your stuff is WAY more detailed.

Going out to see if I can tackle the press work!

 

Success! Err, at least for the most part. I got the bearings out, but the inner race is stuck - was sort of expecting it. Gonna break for a bit & drag out the Dremel next. I think the new goal for the day might be just getting the new bearings pressed in...if that. I'm doing this solo and it's a LOT of work...getting in a workout today. I've never tried to work with a press like this before - definitely a bit of a learning curve. If I could go back to when I ordered the steel I'd have done a good bit longer than 8" with at least 2 of the plates. I sort of planned to take pictures through all this, but it's enough work just getting the job done and it's pretty dirty too.

Something that worked for me along the way - the sleeve/adapter kit I picked up at HF didnt have a sleeve small enough to do the first press. However I just went out and bought a Tekton deep well 35mm impact socket for the axle nut that worked nicely. $17 for a socket, but now that I know it's good for that it's a little more valuable.

 

Yeah i bought the 3/4"drive ratchet set from China freight just for the big sockets for pressing with. I got the whole set for $20, and that's about all it's good for.

 

All done!



Not without an issue though. When I went to install the ABS ring and spacer I fought with myself whether or not to grease these two. Recall these were moving around freely before I removed them. As you might be guessing by this point, I greased them. Not a lot - just a light coating. Now they turn smoothly, but not freely like before - when they were dry. So what's going on is my ABS is kicking in on that wheel below 5 MPH unless I come to a stop really slowly. What I think is happening now is a speed differential between the 2 wheels, which the computer is interpreting as a locked wheel. Not sure if there is a workaround, but I am not going to rebuild it again just to fix the issue. I guess I could just do the other wheel and maybe fix it? Or maybe they would just both do it then?

About that - I was pretty sure I knew which one was the trouble wheel and sure enough - it was the passenger side. It looked like most of the wear was just on one side of the bearing. The outer race on the other side looked pretty good. The bearings on the bad side were pitted and seized, but I've seen worse. They were still intact & in their cages. Felt and sounded like there was nothing in there but rocks though. The truck is nice & smooth now so I'm in no rush to do this other bearing. Unless it will fix the ABS issue then I'll do it maybe in a month when work gets slow. The next few weeks are going to be pretty busy.

@Timmah! you asked about reinstalling the ABS ring spacer/securing ring on the non-manual hub. I wound up using a few light taps on a plate with a hammer. And again I greased it which appears to have been a mistake - at least having these turning at different rates seems to be a problem. Also, thank you again for the videos and comments. I couldn't have done this without the help. Just wanted to take a moment & say it's really kickass that you make these videos. They're outstanding tutorials - some of the best I've ever tried to use. I know it takes lots of effort to put these together - thanks for that. Your work is an amazing asset to the community.

Steve, thank you too - thanks for all the advice from everyone! I learned a bunch doing this and am gonna stop back in and share all that as time allows. But this has consumed quite a lot of my time the last 2 weeks so I'm gonna go rescue what's left of my weekend. Again thanks all for helping get this 1st gen back on the road!

Cheers!

 

That's interesting about the ABS issue. I would think it would be impossible for the ABS tone ring or the bearing spacer to move independently once the CV axle is torqued to spec. The CV axle torqued to that high value of 174 ft-lbs preloads the bearing. That means there's pressure being exerted on both sides of the bearing. With the manual hubs, the lock nut being torqued to 205 ft-lbs preloads the bearing. For my manual hub swap, I swapped the parts over to my 4runner knuckles with ABS ports and installed the ABS tone rings under the lock nut and against the bearing to retain ABS function. With the lock nuts tightened down to spec, the ABS tone ring can't move independently of the hub spindle or bearing.

I really doubt just because you used some grease on the spacer and ABS sensor that caused the issue your experiencing. I would have done the same as you and greased those parts to make the assembly easier. I think something else is going on here, what, I don't know.

Glad the videos my buddy Sean and I made helped you out. It definitely is a lot of work for us to make these videos but we like helping people out. We like the challenge, the sense of accomplishment and we love hearing back from people like yourself that let us know they were successful following one of our tutorials.

 

Thanks for the note on the ABS stuff. Gonna be looking into that to see if I can find a solution as time allows. Till then though just gonna drive. Maybe something just needs to wear in. I didn't get very far on my test drive. Maybe some heat from the brakes & a few bumps will help.

 

I've been hunting around Boulder to find a socket big enough to get the CV nut off. Do you remember what size it is? 35 or 36mm?

I tried replacing the ball joints without removing the steering knuckle from the CV, but there isn't enough room to get the UBJ pressed in with the knuckle still attached, so now I need to remove it :/

@rob feature / @Timmah!

 

glad you got finished with your job replacing bearings. you have learned some valuable skills you can carry with you the rest of your life, and build on your knowledge as you go along. keep your press, I believe tinman tech has a video on replacing rear bearings and construction of the tool you will need. at some point in the future you may have to do that job also. I am very happy to be of some small help. best of luck steve also best to tinman tech for helping you to

 

Hey Jason, I was actually able to press out the upper balljoint with the knuckle still attached but it was a pain in the ass and required an extra sets of hands. In the Toytec Boss Lift video we made, we disconnected the brake line, turned the knuckle so the arm was parallel to the ground and then was able to get the balljoint press on. It requires quite a bit of force to remove, so I needed somebody holding the knuckle steady while I cranked on the balljoint lever arm. Since making that video, I prefer to remove the knuckle completely like you did, clamp the knuckle in a vise so it's held steady and then I can easily get the balljoint press in place and apply the necessary force to drive the old one out and the new one back in.

I plan on helping somebody with replacing their upper balljoints on the 22nd of this month and I'll make a video of the job.

 

I was able to press the UBJ out while still in the truck, but with the different spacers to press it back in and flipping the big C-clamp over to use as a press, the CV is right where the long threaded piece wants to be.

 

35...got the deep well impact Tekton from Jax - nice socket. It's perfect for driving the inner race as well - 1st press in the wheel bearing procedure.

I got the UBJ out using a 2-jaw puller with the knuckle still attached.

 

I was able to loosen the CV nut with a 36mm I borrowed from the auto parts store with the LBJ loosely connected and the top of the knuckle tied up with a rope. It was a huge pain to press the new UBJ in with all the tools I borrowed. The 4WD kit pieces are too long for the c-clamp press in the normal UBJ kit, so I ended up using a flat steel plate under the UBJ and one of the 4WD kit spacers. The passenger side has taken me several hours over two days so far. Hopefully the drivers side only takes me 3 hours after all I learned so far. I'm glad my wheel bearings are good because it would have taken way too long to do those as well.

 

I just purchased an 02 Tacoma Prerunner and was wanting your guys's professional expertise if this is something I should take on or not. I wouldn't go as far as buying a press to replace the bearing(bring it into a local shop for that).

I have only done oil changes on my vehicles along with replacing brake pads on both an 09 Scion TC and a 2010 Kia Forte. Not sure if this is something I should dive into, or just get done at a local shop.

Thoughts?

 

I'm certainly no pro, but pulled it off. It wasn't easy. I needed a lot of tools - most of which I already had. The press work was the most difficult and time consuming and required a lot of planning so cutting that out would make it WAY easier. Disassembly took a lot longer than re-assembly because the nuts & bolts had been in place for quite a long time. Watch Timmah!'s videos & see if it looks like something you wanna tackle.