1999 dodge wheel bearings
- Thread starter RT-NY
- Start date
Rockauto is the best place I know of to look to find both the dimensions and/or part numbers to look up the specs. Personally, I would never replace just the race as matched sets cone and cup always seem to hold up better. Cheap wheel bearings have also gotten very, very poor the last few years so stick with on of the big name, higher cost ones. If you are worried about the cones being loose in hub, there is a high likelyhood they will be so center punch knurling or bearing sizer super high temp locker might be necessary. Almost every older tapered roller bearing hub I have seen in the last 20 years has had loose races.
For a driver, they make universal driver sets, but on wheel bearing setups I usually just take the old race and grind a little bit off the OD of it and use that as a driver. I have a whole drawer full of them after 50 years of doing this stuff.
Rockauto link
For a driver, they make universal driver sets, but on wheel bearing setups I usually just take the old race and grind a little bit off the OD of it and use that as a driver. I have a whole drawer full of them after 50 years of doing this stuff.
Rockauto link
Thanks! It looks like the "AC Delco Gold" bearings are readily available -- any thoughts on their quality? Also, do you have any recommendations of the best wheel bearing grease to use? I had a local mechanic do them last time and they wore out too quickly, so I want to do it right this time!
It is hard to predict on anything Delco any more, I think. Some of the stuff I have seen was just run of the mill Chinese "equivalent" product.
SKF and Timken are said by most information I have seen lately, are still making decent bearings although not like older USA version bullet proof ones. For grease, I have been using Royal Purple full synthetic grease. They, and many other brands, have started to recommend the full synthetic greases over the old school stringy wheel bearing greases, even in taper roller older designs. I had had it in the similar tapered roller setup in my 96 Buick Roadmaster that weighs 5K# for probably near 10 years now and it has always looked great and stayed in the bearing well when inspected.
The big deal is to make sure you adjust the correct amount of slack in the bearings. Many shops and people get them too tight and burn them up.
SKF and Timken are said by most information I have seen lately, are still making decent bearings although not like older USA version bullet proof ones. For grease, I have been using Royal Purple full synthetic grease. They, and many other brands, have started to recommend the full synthetic greases over the old school stringy wheel bearing greases, even in taper roller older designs. I had had it in the similar tapered roller setup in my 96 Buick Roadmaster that weighs 5K# for probably near 10 years now and it has always looked great and stayed in the bearing well when inspected.
The big deal is to make sure you adjust the correct amount of slack in the bearings. Many shops and people get them too tight and burn them up.
TomF-ClassB
Senior Member
I used to repack my own wheel bearings, but a couple of years ago, I had a young mechanic do them. Not too long later, the right front bearings exploded and it was a wonder I didn't roll the van. I had to resource a used spindle and replaced the bearings myself. The next season, the left front bearings started to hum and when I checked them, I found the nut turned down tight, no play at all. The inner cage had come apart. I think a lot of mechanics nowadays have never seen open bearings. An older guy at a tire store asked if my 1997 wheel bearings were sealed when I inquired about servicing them. Yikes!
The factory service manual says to tighten it to 30-40 ft. lbs. to "preload bearing while rotating hub/rotor" then loosen then nut and then tighten to "finger tight." I have heard elsewhere to tighten it down until its hard to turn the wheel then back it off 1/4 turn. Lacking a tool to measure the end-play, what do you think is the best way to do this?
I have never cared for either of those procedures as they don't actually measure the important thing, bearing clearance.
This what I do and why.
Tighten to the 20-40# or even lower while rotating the wheel/hub.
Loosen until you grab the bottom and top of the tire and be able to rock the wheel on the now loose bearings.
Slowly tighten the nut while rotating the tire, stopping every 1/16th turn until you can feel no rock.
Loosen until the rock just comes back where you can feel it.
An old timer taught me this decades ago and he had been a front end guy for decades by then.
The reason behind it all is that none of this is what the bearing manufacturers actually spec for clearance.
They will say they want .001-.003" of clearance or other amounts.
ln an automotive wheel bearing setup that is nearly impossible to measure adequately so you expand the movement to something you can feel, like the wheel rocking to get the right clearance.
In the industrial applications an my jobs, we had the tools and the designs accommodated the setup so it could be directly measured. Mostly we used shimmed clearance so we went to no movement and added the right shim to controlling cover.
Tapered roller bearings are great things and will run for a very, very long time if setup right and kept lubricated properly.
I've done more or less the same tighten, then loosen until I can get a cotter key notch to line up. I have not used fibered grease in a few years, the new NL2 something high pressure and temperature grease is now recommended. I have never (knock on wood) had any type of bearing failure.
Pilgrim-ClassB
Member
Synthetic grease only for me, since 1977. Never had a wheel bearing fail.
The "lifetime" lubrication wheel bearings are a later day design. We geezers remember when every vehicle had greaseable front wheel bearings.
Back in the day the recommendation was at least ever 10K miles but few did that from what I saw. Probably a good spec for the grease available then and amount of gravel roads they saw.
Remove the hub and clean both bearings that are loose and races in the hub. Throw out the inboard seal and replace it after the cleaned and packed with grease bearing is reinstalled on the inner side. Put on the hub and then install and adjust the outer bearing for correct clearance. Only put grease in the bearing, not the hub center or cap as it can cause overheating. A good shop could do a good job on them in under 20 minutes as they had bearing grease packing fixtures which saved a lot of time.
With good synthetic grease I would guess you could go 20K miles or more if you don't spend a lot of time on gravel or in deep water.
Yes even more than wrong, dangerous. I can't believe this post.
"I cant believe this post" is not helpful. And it is arrogant and insulting!
Why is it dangerous? Your driving a 10,000 Lb vehicle on the highway at 70 mph, and the front wheel bearing fails, you ignore and the bearing overheats and the spindle snaps off leaving your truck skidding across the highway, injuring yourself or someone else.
It nearly happened to me, nobody told me the new chevy Silverado 2014 sealed front wheel bearings did not last at least 100,000 miles. Mine had less than 85,000 when one failed on the road. The bearing was smoking hot before I could find a safe place to pull off.
Thanks to a Chevrolet dealer outside of Chicago I was back on the road in 3 hours. When I got home I had the other side replaced as a preventive measure, deciding now I knew.
As Booster and others on here pointed out wheel bearing grease repacking is a common sense preventative measure. I have done mine for years, better to do it at home than stuck on the Alcan Highway waiting for a tow.
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I think the reality is that we never know when things are going fail and sometimes we get no warning. When our sealed front wheel hub failed on our 07 Chevy there was no warning. No grinding, no smoke, no hot smell, just after a stop the wheel wouldn't rotate any more.
Preventative helps, but doesn't eliminate the risk and greasing the old school bearings helps but they can still fail unexpectedly.
Knowledge is power and that is what the forum is best at, helping all that come to learn about all the RV stuff they don't know about and a lot of that is that a one ton truck is not a car and needs different care and feeding.
One question I would ask of all Chevy class Bs is if they know how the rear wheel bearings work on the old models and newer?
My guess is that no more than maybe 20% will know, but it is only because they didn't know they should know in the first place.
The answer is not related to old or new models, it is only on axle design.
The smaller, usually 9.5-9.75" models are almost always semi floating design. You can tell by looking to see if the is a big ugly hub sticking out past your rear wheel centers. If there in not one, it is the smaller semi floater.
The rear wheel bearings on these do not have an inner race and are not sealed except for a replaceable seal. You don't grease them because they lubricate from the differential oil. The Axle it selself is the the inner race and after probably 70K miles they should be checked periodically, On this style rear axle if the bearing fails it can cause the axle to break and this style that means the entire rear wheel separates from the van and that is dangerous to say the least. Any cracking, pitting or gouges on the axle shaft means it should be replaced.
The larger, normally 10.5" axles are full floating axles that use a stub shaft on the housing to hold two massive tappered roller bearing just like a front wheel setup on steroids. The axle just drive a the hub and doesn't support any weight so if it breaks you don't lose the wheel, you just coast so much safer. A full floater does not need greasing as it also runs in the differential oil, but the adjustment should be checked occasionally.
I am nearly 100% sure that those with semi floating rear axle Chevies are much more likely to lose a rear wheel to axle breakage than a front wheel do to knuckle failure.
Preventative helps, but doesn't eliminate the risk and greasing the old school bearings helps but they can still fail unexpectedly.
Knowledge is power and that is what the forum is best at, helping all that come to learn about all the RV stuff they don't know about and a lot of that is that a one ton truck is not a car and needs different care and feeding.
One question I would ask of all Chevy class Bs is if they know how the rear wheel bearings work on the old models and newer?
My guess is that no more than maybe 20% will know, but it is only because they didn't know they should know in the first place.
The answer is not related to old or new models, it is only on axle design.
The smaller, usually 9.5-9.75" models are almost always semi floating design. You can tell by looking to see if the is a big ugly hub sticking out past your rear wheel centers. If there in not one, it is the smaller semi floater.
The rear wheel bearings on these do not have an inner race and are not sealed except for a replaceable seal. You don't grease them because they lubricate from the differential oil. The Axle it selself is the the inner race and after probably 70K miles they should be checked periodically, On this style rear axle if the bearing fails it can cause the axle to break and this style that means the entire rear wheel separates from the van and that is dangerous to say the least. Any cracking, pitting or gouges on the axle shaft means it should be replaced.
The larger, normally 10.5" axles are full floating axles that use a stub shaft on the housing to hold two massive tappered roller bearing just like a front wheel setup on steroids. The axle just drive a the hub and doesn't support any weight so if it breaks you don't lose the wheel, you just coast so much safer. A full floater does not need greasing as it also runs in the differential oil, but the adjustment should be checked occasionally.
I am nearly 100% sure that those with semi floating rear axle Chevies are much more likely to lose a rear wheel to axle breakage than a front wheel do to knuckle failure.
Well my 2008 Chevy RT has disk brakes all the way around, so if that seal was leaking I would see. Not sure on the front wheel bearings sealed or not? I plan to taking to the local dealer or a truck shop to have it all checked out, wheel bearings and all. Changing the rear axle lube is on the list. I spent 4 years in the USAF where I learned PM is a must if you want to keep flying!! So the front bearings are the sealed hub assy and all, wonder what the official life is on those? Rear bearings are like you said, just a seal and bearing set lubed by the rear axle fluid.
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You appear to be talking about a GMC pickup? I have no experience with them. All the Roadtreks were on Chevy chassis. Do you know for certain they will pull the axle shafts to check the axles, it is quite a bit of work because you have to remove the axle keepers inside the differential and replace the seal every time. Very few shops will do that stuff and will just spin the wheel and say good to go.
The 210s are somewhere in the 500# heavier in the rear, on average than the 190s so they are more in danger of rear bearing failures, I think. If you take hub temps after a long hot highway run you probably will find a semi floater running much hotter than the front hubs, but if you have a full floater they will be about the same even with the front/rear weight difference. That is exactly what I saw when I switched ours to a full floater.
Hey booster, let's tell folks that you can and should lube the front sealed wheel bearings on Chevies. I need to do mine again soon.
www.classbforum.com
Greasing Chevy sealed wheel bearings
Discussions of wheel bearing failures in Chevies (in particular) have been pretty common on several of the class B forums. One topic that comes up regularly is if it is possible to grease the "sealed" Chevy front wheel bearings. I did a bunch of reading last year during one of the discussions...
www.classbforum.com
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