Wheel Bearings

[swhird]

My 2002 XLT had one of the rear wheel bearings go out at 155k miles. It went from unnoticeable to nearly undrivable in 20 miles which was disconcerting; fortunately I got it home. My question is should I replace the other side even though it shows no signs of trouble? I've read numerous places that wheel bearings tend to go out because they were damaged and not so much because of wear.

Incase someone is interested, we could not get some of the outer races out with any home tools (sledge hammer, 6 ton press) so I took it to my mechanic and he pressed out the races and pressed in the new bearing for $50 which was nice.

 

[94Eddie]

Third and fourth gen Explorers don't seem to need much reason for the wheel bearings to go bad. IMO, after 100k miles roll up the odds of them failing start increasing exponentially as time passes. I would probably do both sides just to save the hassle of doing it later.

 

[Donystoy]

Just hope you went for good quality bearings. I have replaced all of mine and the only one that was not SKF lasted about 10,000 miles and had to be replaced a second time.

 

[swhird]

I did not get SKF I went with National. Any experience with them?

 

[Donystoy]

Not sure on the quality of National but someone else might chime in. There is no shortage of inferior quality of just about anything these days so research is a must.

 

[donalds]

I have used national bearings on lots of stuff
Inc my front wheel bearings
They're a name brand
I'd use em

However the quality has been going down in recent years imo

Just my experience

 

[Swappart]

I did mine on my 03 mountaineer last month. It's very important to torque them to 203 ft-lbs. Over or under torquing will result in premature failure. Also supposed to replace the nuts, but I've seen people double nut them. If you plan on pressing them yourself, an old rotor with the center cut out makes a great support for the knuckle. I used the Harbor Freight 20 ton press. The only thing which may be 20 ton about that is the jack. It did the job even though it bent the top of the press a little. Pressing the old bearings out is the hardest part. If you can go to a local machine shop and have them make you a couple of custom press dies to fit the inner and outer races, you will save yourself a lot of frustration. I doubt that would cost more than 30 bucks. I used various adapters from a balljoint press which I rented from Advanced Auto, and an impact socket was used to press the hub out. The outer race of one of the old bearings can be used to press the new bearings in. You just have to grind a couple thousandths off of the end you'll be pressing with. Also, if your dust shields are rotted out, it's a good time to replace them since they have to go on before the hub gets pressed in.

 

[Swappart]

One more thing to note. Don't overlook other potential sources of the grinding. I drove for months on a bad bearing, and it still wasn't that bad when I replaced it. It was just the slightest bit of play in it. After replacing both, and the front ones were new a year ago, I still had a grinding sound coming from the rear. Sounded slightly different, but still grinding. Turned out to be a bad U-joint. Completely seized in one direction.

 

[swhird]

Thanks Swappart for the information. My torque wrench only goes to 170 ft-lbs so I guessed after that. I'm going to get a better torque wrench and re-tighten.

 

[Swappart]

You're welcome. I got the Husky 50-250 ft-lb torque wrench from Home Depot. It was on sale for $49.97. Regular price is 89.97. Just checked and its it's still on sale. I had to go to 3 different stores to finally find one, despite them all showing several in stock online.

 

[TechGuru]

I usually "rent" a high capacity torque wrench from AutoZone's loan-a-tool. It's $100 and you get it all back when you return it. Mine only goes to 150.