Wheel bearing replacement, what a twat of a job that was!

[chip-3door]

Me and MarkT changed a wheel bearing on our E30 yesterday.

Massive thanks to Chris from www.passionford.com for the loan of the appropriate homemade puller.

Even with that it was a complete bitch to get the bearing out, would have been impossible to just beat it out!

In the end to get it to budge we had 23 stone of MarkT hanging off 2 foot of extended spanner on the puller to preload it, then we got it nice and hot to expland the arm a little, and finally encouraged it to then move by beating it with a hammer.



Not a pleasant job at all.

Took us about 3-4 hours in the end!!!!

[Ziggy]

I think that's added (along with rear subframe bushes) to my short list of things that just ain't worth doing myself!

[chip-3door]

I think that's added (along with rear subframe bushes) to my short list of things that just ain't worth doing myself!

Dont let it put you off having a go yourslef mate, just make sure you allow a reasonable amount of time, have a mate helping, and get hold of the right puller.


The puller we borrowed was just some M14 studded bar with an appropriately machined bit of box section to fit through the rear of the trailing arm to locate on the bearing, and then a few more bits of box and plate to allow you to pull from the front, wasnt anything expensive, you could knock it up yourself in a few hours.
We also got lean a really nice drift for putting the bearing back in with too, but a correctly sized (huge!) socket could be used instead, anything that allows you purchase on the outer edge of the race basically.

[Hyperion]

holy crap , my driver side bearings gave up the ghost a while ago. but i didnt do it myself i gave it to mechanic to do it....poor bastard

[chip-3door]

PS

next job now is the rear shoes, they look like the original ones that came with the car from the factory still

[Adammcf]

Good job getting them out. I'll know who to call when mine need done. lol

[Geeman]

Those rear shoes are fooked! Suprised you get anything happening when you pull the handbrake lever!

Good job with the bearings though... not a job I like doing either.

[chip-3door]

Those rear shoes are fooked! Suprised you get anything happening when you pull the handbrake lever!

Good job with the bearings though... not a job I like doing either.

amazingly the handbrake works perfectly and passed the MOT with flying colours less than a week ago!