How To Repack Your 4WD Front Wheel Bearings - Revisited

[Dr_Snooz]

Hard to believe it's been more than 8 years since I wrote this thread about repacking your front wheel bearings:

http://forum.73-87chevytrucks.com/smforum/index.php?topic=31594.msg265353#msg265353

In it, I packed the wheel bearings incorrectly, smearing a light coating of grease around the outsides of the bearings, then placing them in the races, giving a good turn and calling it good. I've had a long time to drive on those bearings now, and I'm tired of having that horribly gouged rotor at the back of my mind, so I figured I'd open it up again and see just how bad a poor bearing pack could be.

The TLDR version is that 2 bearings need to be replaced, and 2 other bearings were fine. You can blame me for poor workmanship, and I won't argue, but there's more to the story. Please read on.

Let me say first that the bearings were so packed with grease, 3 parts washings didn't get it all out. You can make an argument that maybe the bearings had a few dry revolutions starting out, but they still got thoroughly packed with grease. In addition, there were some other failures that might have more to do with the bearings going bad than my pack job.

Here is the driver side outer bearing, which looks fine to me:



It's not great, but it will make it to the next bearing repack, no problem.

The inner bearing is another story:



This one is obviously sad. There's a striation across the middle of all the rollers and there is copper peaking through on all of them. The black squiggly in the foremost roller is pitting.



Here's another view, sadly out of focus. Even so, you can still see that the rollers have worn through to copper. So this bearing is done. The more interesting thing to note here is the rust on the inside of the inner race. Turns out the axle shaft seal totally failed maybe a decade ago, and I never tore down far enough to see it.



There was so much water, I have to replace my spindle hub:



I didn't get pics of it, but the other side is basically the same story. Failed seals, failed inner bearing with a decent outer bearing.

My packing job was clearly sub-standard, but I have to say that this doesn't look like premature failure from too little grease to me. The bearing does not appear to have gotten hot, or to have spun. Nor does it look like water failure, even though there is rust damage. To me, this looks like age failure. These are just old, high-mileage bearings. I'm not the final word on this, by any means, so please weigh in below with your own thoughts.

It's worth mentioning that everything on this axle is plumb wore out. The U-joints are shot. The ball joints are shot. The axle seals are shot. The diff carrier bearings are shot. The spider gears are heavily worn. Obviously, the driver's rotor is a catastrophe. The calipers, by some miracle, weren't leaking, but the rubber brake lines are cracked and the guide pins worn. I was going to rebuild the calipers, but there was so much I needed for them that buying partially loaded rebuilt units was cheaper. I would be really surprised if the wheel bearings didn't look like this.

The axle needs a total rebuild, of course. You can follow along with that on my build thread, if you want.

http://forum.73-87chevytrucks.com/smforum/index.php?topic=31306.45

It won't be Pirate4x4 worthy, but it will be a respectable build, nonetheless.

[Mr Diesel]

After reading your other thread i suspect there was not enough grease, which contributed to wear. You are probably right that a lot had to do with just normal wear too. Nothing lasts forever.

I'm not surprised the grease was fully infused into the bearing from  your previous pack job. Heat softens the grease, sometimes to a runny state, and helps it to become fully worked into the bearing. I personally think the most important thing you can do with a repack is sufficient volume of grease around the bearing and not so much how much you get into the bearing. Heat will do that for you pretty quick. I pack all mine by hand thoroughly, then pack gobs of grease around them.

Years ago I bought a car with a bearing repack done by previous owner. Volume of grease was so inadequate the bearing fused itself together and I had to use a torch to cut it all out. I pulled the other side apart and found same thing about to happen because he had only used a thin layer of grease.

[JohnnyPopper]

The spindle race for the internal bearing looks clean. The rust in between is inconsequential. I would not replace the spindle

[Captkaos]

I wouldnt replace that spindle, it is in the void area.  put some rust neutralizer on it and run it.
You also have a picture of it already starting to rust when you did it the first time, and someone pointed out the proper method for packing as listed below.

Looking at your post (which I haven't seen before) this is the problem:
There is a lot of differing opinion on the best way to repack bearings. You can buy special tools if you want. I just smear a big gob of grease across the rollers, stuff it back in the hub and give it a good turn.



There is only one way to repack a bearing and why you had issues.  Completely clean them to inspect them removing all the old grease out, replace as needed.  For repacking, you literally have to pack the grease into the voids in the bearing.  This is typically done by putting a gob of grease in your palm and effectively smashing the bearing into the grease until it comes out the other end all while rotating the bearing in your had.  WEAR Gloves, this is messy.
With the bearing effectively loaded, I then coat the outside and inside with more grease along with the race and the hub with lots of grease for 4x4 applications as water WILL finds its way back in.

[ehjorten]

What Captkaos said, only why wear gloves, that grease is good for your skin!

Put a gob of grease in your palm. Grasp the bearing by one side and then take a "bite" out of the grease in your palm, pressing the one side of the bearing into your palm and then drag it back out of the grease in one smooth motion. Pick the wider end of the bearing. You are trying to drive the grease up between the rollers, and between the cage and inner race. As you do this you can slowly rotate the bearing, or you can keep doing it in one location until the grease starts to extrude up through the top of the rollers, then rotate it a little. You are manually doing what that bearing packing tool is doing. Also...I pack grease into the void in the hub between the inner and outer bearings.

[Dr_Snooz]

The spindle race for the internal bearing looks clean. The rust in between is inconsequential. I would not replace the spindle

Thanks for all the feedback! I'm not so worried about the big rust spot in the middle. It's the spots of rust on the sealing surface that have me concerned. I won't feel confident with my new wheel seals running across those chunky spots.

[ehjorten]

You can try cleaning up the sealing surface with some emery cloth. If the pitting is too deep, then it is time for a speedi sleeve! https://www.skf.com/us/products/industrial-seals/power-transmission-seals/wear-sleeves/skf-speedi-sleeve

Best to clean  up the surface as best you can with emery cloth. Take a long piece and wrap it around the shaft, then pull it back and forth and rotate your direction of pull around the shaft. Don't just scrub the spots with it. You want to keep the machining nice and round and work it evenly all around the diameter. You really want to get rid of as much of the pitting as you can before you install the speedi sleeve. The material is pretty thin and will conform to imperfections.