The plan was to replace my wheel bearings. After some issues at Expo I felt the right front was getting ready to go, so I might as well do both at the same time. So, Jason, a buddy of mine, comes over yesterday morning to give me a hand with what we thought was going to be a straight forward, but admittedly difficult procedure. Here's how it all went down:

Before it all began I picked up the new bearings from the dealer and ordered this tool from JC Whitney. (part # 81ZX2149N) After hearing the horror stories of torn boots by separating the ball joints using a pickle fork I decided it was a good tool to have. Besides, for $18 it was worth a shot.


So, Sat morning we get started around 11 and have the calipers and rotors off in no time. We un-stake the spindle nuts and attempt to remove them with a 32mm socket and an 18" breaker bar. No go. Add a pipe to the breaker bar for more leverage. No go. We busted out the PB and soaked em good and let em sit for a bit. Still no go.

They had been removed once before by the dealer, and as far as I can tell, they had an elephant sit on a 6 foot bar to torque them down again, cause those suckers were not coming off. We had been owned.

So, we hop in Jason's truck and head back to his house (an hour away) to pick up his air tools. (Yes, we know. He should have brought them in the first place. Next time I say we shouldn't need them, bring them anyway.)

3 hours later we get back to the house and unload the tank and fire it up. After tripping the breaker in the garage 3 times we get enough air to give it a shot.


Our victory was swift and decisive. Those spindle nuts had no chance. A compressor and an impact wrench have moved up on my list of must have tools.

So with the spindle nuts off we move on to the ball joints. We grease up the tool and insert it between the boot and the lca and proceed to tighten the bolt to close the jaws of the tool.


The picture was taken to illustrate how to do it correctly, but, ironically, it shows exactly what we were doing wrong. You'll notice that we did not have the lower tip of the ball joint remover positioned correctly on the bolt, nor did we put the nut back on to protect the threads like it says in the Helms.

The end result:


Once again, we were owned.

After learning our lesson we were able to correctly pop off the remaining 5 ball joints without too much trouble. The problem is, if you go back to the top and look at the tool, when you push the upper portion of the tool underneath the boot all the way to seat it correctly the lower tip doesn't lineup correctly. The trick is to align the lower tip with the bolt and only use the tip of the fingers underneath the boot.

It's about 6 pm now and we have both knuckles off the car and it's time to separate the hubs from the knuckles and pull out the old bearings.



From the description in the helms, I was expecting the hub to come out of the knuckle with the inner race attached fairly easily. That was not the case. After beating on it with a sledge and trying to setup something to support the knuckle and hub assembly while we whacked it from above, it was apparent that we were getting no where. So we head out again to find some sort of bearing press/extractor and to pick up a new lower ball joint to replace the one we tweaked earlier.

Finally, at 9:30 we are back with the new ball joint and a setup we think will work for the extraction. We couldn't find a bearing press kit, but we did find a plug for a 1/2" drive socket that we can use in conjunction with my gear puller to get the hub out.

Here's the setup in action.


And a close-up showing the 32mm socket with the 1/2" plug.


With a combination of torquing the puller and tapping it with a hammer we were able to separate the hub from the knuckle.




However, the inner race is still attached to the hub, and the rest of the bearing is still in the knuckle, and neither one of them wants to budge. We try to hammer the bearing out of the knuckle, but can't seem to make any progress whatsoever, and there is no way to use the puller either.

The inner race is so far down on to the hub that there is no way to get the gear puller in there to separate them, like what's shown in the Helms.


So, at this point we are admitting defeat. Without the right tools, like the ones shown in the Helms, I can't see how we can get the old bearings out, much less the new ones in. I think I'm going to take the knuckles to a shop on Monday and let them do it for me. At least we were able to save some money by removing the knuckles from the car, and we managed to save 5 out of the 6 ball joint boots.

For anyone that has done this job themselves, where did we go wrong? What did you use to pull the old bearing? How did you pull the inner race from the hub?

Any help would be appreciated.

 

http://www.harborfreight.com/c...=2457

 

There is a big circlip holding the bearing in the knuckle. You can see the two tabs sticking up in your next-to-last picture. It's easy to remove. After that, you'll need to press, or pull it out. I have a rather cheap harbor freight press that I use. May be possible to use a puller.

I've never been able to remove the inner race with what tools I have. It would probably help to have a bearing separator to get it pushed up enough to get either get a puller underneath it, or who knows how else...

 

didnt anyone teach u.. (the helms) to put the castle nut on backwards when using tools like that...

EDIT: My bad..i read your post the second time


Modified by ragejed at 11:17 AM 5/4/2003

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by JeffS &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">After that, you'll need to press, or pull it out. I have a rather cheap harbor freight press that I use. May be possible to use a puller. </TD></TR></TABLE>

ditto. or you can take that to a machine shop for them to do it.

 

I still don't understand why people buy that lame *** tool to separate the lower ball joint. I thought willard and the rest of the we-todds had illustrated the easy way to take care of this many times. shrug.

you can use a bearing separator and a press to remove the inner race from the hub, otherwise... i've also previoiusly taken a grinder, and ground 2 slots in the inner race itself, so that i could use a 2 prong puller to remove it from the hub. Hit it with a map gas torch and it'll come off like butta.

D

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by D &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I still don't understand why people buy that lame *** tool to separate the lower ball joint. I thought willard and the rest of the we-todds had illustrated the easy way to take care of this many times. shrug.

</TD></TR></TABLE>

Any idea how to get off the tie rod bolt? Same idea..but i got the nut loose already..about 4 turns..then it got stuck. The ball joint it loose too...as i move the stuck nut..ball joint mooves, ARGH!

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by ragejed &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Any idea how to get off the tie rod bolt? Same idea..but i got the nut loose already..about 4 turns..then it got stuck. The ball joint it loose too...as i move the stuck nut..ball joint mooves, ARGH!</TD></TR></TABLE>

We actually had that same problem with one of the lower control arm ball joints. We had to use the floor jack under the lca to lift it and put some weight back on the joint so the ball wouldn't slip in its socket. Of course, all this was compounded by prodigious amounts of grease and PB that had worked its way in there.

Not real sure what you can do with the tie rod though. Maybe some rubber tips on a pair of Vicegrips above or below the nut?

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by D &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I still don't understand why people buy that lame *** tool to separate the lower ball joint. I thought willard and the rest of the we-todds had illustrated the easy way to take care of this many times. shrug.</TD></TR></TABLE>

lol. I kept telling Jason that if we posted on H-T the we-todds would just tell us to hit it with a BFH.

I guess I was trying to be a little more proffessional with my approach, but look where that got me.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Floyd &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

I guess I was trying to be a little more proffessional with my approach, but look where that got me. </TD></TR></TABLE>

The hammer IS the professional approach believe itor not....

 

Whats "Tequiza"?

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Floyd &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

</TD></TR></TABLE>

 

very true the BFH and a vice is the pro way. Then use the grinder and cut the last piece of the race that is stuck on the hub.....becareful not to cut a deep groove on the spindle.......unfortunately they don't make a good tool to do this stuff....also, when you put back the lower ball joint, put antisieze on the spindle of the ball joint...and next time just take a hammer and bang on the side of the mount and it will pop loose.........

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Dr Pooface &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Whats "Tequiza"?
</TD></TR></TABLE>

Nasty crap.

It's "tequila-flavoured" beer.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by ragejed &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

Any idea how to get off the tie rod bolt? Same idea..but i got the nut loose already..about 4 turns..then it got stuck. The ball joint it loose too...as i move the stuck nut..ball joint mooves, ARGH!</TD></TR></TABLE>

Yes, the impact wrench is the only way to remove those once they start to spin freely.

Everyone knows that the 'got owned per hour' rate of any mechanical endeavor is inversely proportional to the amount of beer consumed. Problem is that the Tequiza in the photo was beer #1 and that was already 12 hours into the whole debacle. You see Floyd we'll have to get the beer flowing earlier if we hope to re-assemble her without hassle. -Jaseun

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by George Knighton &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

ROFL....

I guess there was no Vulcan science vessel in the general vicinity.</TD></TR></TABLE>

lol. And, unfortunately, Team McLaren didn't have any of their trucks parked outside of my house either, or else I would have had that press.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by D &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I still don't understand why people buy that lame *** tool to separate the lower ball joint. I thought willard and the rest of the we-todds had illustrated the easy way to take care of this many times. shrug.

</TD></TR></TABLE>

...and this method would be?

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by joeseph &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

...and this method would be?</TD></TR></TABLE>

to beat it with a sledge -Jaseun

 

Floyd - thanks for posting up your trials and tribulations - I'm about to do the wheel bearings in my R, and I was worried about how hard it's gonna be... Now I know - (and I know what not to do...). So, anyway, hope you can get it straightened out today...
H-Tech - sharing the knowledge (and mistakes) = priceless

 

ahhhh live and learn

good post

 

Here's a little secret.

8:00am - Remove the knuckles. 9:00am - Take the new bearings and knuckles(with old bearings still in place) to a competent machine shop. Throw frisbee with the dog for three hours. 12:00 noon - pick up knuckles with new bearings installed and pay the shop about $30 bucks for their trouble. 12:30 pm - reinstall knuckles. 1:30pm - go for a drive in the country.

BTW, I have one of those joint separators and I love it. I used to do the hammer thing, but the spreader works nice...less violent!

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Jaseun &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

to beat it with a sledge -Jaseun </TD></TR></TABLE>

Actually the we todd method for the LBJ involved no hammer at all. Since I don't feel like typing it up AGAIN though, you people can do a search for it instead.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by dawhiteboy &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

Actually the we todd method for the LBJ involved no hammer at all. Since I don't feel like typing it up AGAIN though, you people can do a search for it instead.</TD></TR></TABLE>

I have to say the WTDR way of seperating the lower ball joint was impressive. Used it on my last 2 clutch installs.

Trey

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by MK Ultra &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

Nasty crap.

It's "tequila-flavoured" beer. </TD></TR></TABLE>

I don't think that the correct description would be "Tequila Flavored" even though that is what it technically says on the outside of the bottle. There are a couple of other flavors going on in there, none of them are all that great in my opinion.

To be honest and as descriptive as possible, it almost tastes like Corona with lots of sugar and Sprite in it.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by dawhiteboy &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

Actually the we todd method for the LBJ involved no hammer at all. Since I don't feel like typing it up AGAIN though, you people can do a search for it instead.</TD></TR></TABLE>

Is this it? https://honda-tech.com/zerothread?id=446576

I'm a little disapointed, I though the we todd method would involve more fire.

 

Nice I've tried that too, but it won't work for the tie rod end or upper ball joint. The little spreader tool does all three.