Tomorrow I am finally going to have the time to do the front wheel bearings on my 94 accord. After watching an Eric the car guy video I am fairly certain I can get the old bearings and races off but I am a little worried about getting the new bearings on without having access to a press. Does anyone have any tips on getting bearings on a hub?

 

it's easiest with the press. I've tried it without and gave up, ended up taking it in. Then I got myself a press from Harbor Freight and it made the job 10x easier. The press has paid for itself already.

 

That last 1/4" starts to get tight. You will need a press or bring the hubs/bearings to a mechanic to have them pressed on.

 

Freeze the hub and use a torch to heat up the bearing about 25 circles around and it will drop right on it.

 

What would be a fair price for someone to charge to press the bearings on?

 

Wouldn't heating the bearings with a torch burn up the grease inside the bearings?

 

A shop will probably charge around $10 to press it on. Some may just do it for free if it's the only thing they have to do to the bearing. It only takes a minute or so.

 

Well I was ready to tackle it but has really turned into a pain in the azz. The axle nut on the left side came loose pretty easy after I unstaked it. The one on the passenger side I could not get unstaked. So I thought I would replace the axle nut and grind the staked area off the one on the car. That was not a problem. The problem came trying to break the right side axle nut loose. I weigh 230 pounds and was standing bouncing on the 1/2" drive 3 foot long breaker bar and ended up bending it. I then turned it over and stood on it and after about 45 seconds the breaker broke in half. Now I have no idea how I am going to get the right side nut off. To be honest I don't see how it could come off. Anyway I went back to the left side and removed the spindle and hub. Now I have another problem over there. The rotor bolts will not budge and I can not stop the rotor from turning to apply that stand on pressure to try and break them loose. I tried wedging a very large screwdriver between the lugs but that would work for a few seconds and then slip out. I think that if I could get the screwdriver to stay that it will break the lugs off before the bolts break loose. Is there better way to get this apart? All the videos I watched on this they had to have taken things apart and reassembled them before they made the video. It came apart so simple for them. If anyone can offer me any suggestions please help.

 

Eric the car guy has a great youtube vid called "honda captive rotors".

Harbor Freight has both a bearing remover and bearing installer kit if you wanna do the bearing yourself.

 

To remove the axle nut if you have an ex model you can put the knuckle and wheel and caliper back on, start the car, have someone press the brakes, use another breaker bar thats 1/2 inch with a cheater pipe on it, put a jack directly under the axle nut so you have maxumim leverage, and jump like an sob on the pipe/breaker combo. If you dont have an ex you wont be able to have the wheel on but use all the other things

You need to a better job unstaking that nut though.

 

yeah, I butchered the axle nut,but was going to replace it if I could get it off. I don't think I could have put anymore ***** into it. As you can see in the picture I snapped my breaker bar trying to get it broken loose.

 

I had the same problem. I couldn't get it off with a breaker bar. I even tried to use a pipe on the breaker bar and try to drive the car backwards! Didn't work. Fortunately, I was able to gain access to air tools. It even took some time for the air tools to loosen it. That was the only way I could get it off.

 

Even if you cant get the nut off there should be no butchering or rounding of the nut if you put a jack directly underneath to support the axle socket as I suggested. Plus you will get full leverage on the nut as you bounce on the pipe/bar combo.

The reason its not coming off is cause you are wasting torque, combined with the fact that the nut is still staked.

 

^^^^^^^^^
That nut NEEDS to be fully unstaked. A small cold chisel usually does the job quite well.
And as mentioned above, the rotor nuts need to be loosened while it is still on car. I have had luck by quickly cranking the bolts 1/4 turn to break them free with a breaker bar... so you need another one.

If you have not yet, take the socket for the axle nut(after removing the staked on part) and with preferably a single jack, give the socket a good few smacks.

 

Thanks, I thought I had the nut unstaked but since you mentioned it in the picture I see it is still staked a little. I guess I will put the left side back together good enough to break the rotor bolts loose anyway.

 

Well Yesterday I am sure the axle nut was unstaked and I put my floor jack under the lower control arm. I borrowed a friends 1/2" snap on breaker bar and put a pipe on the end. I then climbed my 230 pound self stood on the breaker bar and started a bouncing motion and snap. Another breaker bar falls casualty to trying to get this nut broken loose. It broke in the same place the other one did. My car is a LX but has EX wheels so I am taking it to a shop and see if they can break the nut loose and tighten it so I can get back home and then do the right side bearing. On the left side I broke 3-14mm sockets and snapped the drive shaft off a 3/8" mac ratchet trying to break the rotor bolts loose and never get even one loose. Then I decided to do the bearings with the rotor on the hub. I wanted to take it off so I could have better access to cutting the race off with a cutting wheel but still had plenty of room with it on. After I gave up on the rotor bolts the right side was a piece of cake. Since I was replacing the bearing I tapped it out with a hammer. Then I used a cutting wheel to cut into the race and then split it with a chisel. I sat the hub on a block of wood with a towel in between. Then I used a 2x4 piece of wood wrapped in a towel to install the bearing. From the time I gave up on the rotor bolts until the time I had everything back on the car was about 45 minutes. Was a piece of cake. I do have one question, My german shephard took one of the 4 bolts that thread into the bearing so I only was able to put 3 in. Should I get another bolt from the salvage yard or should it be ok with 3 bolts?

 

Its gotta be catching on that nut. Try this. Tighten the nut again. Then try to unstake it again really good. Then try to loosen it again.

No just get another bolt from the dealer.