tires and wheels Rear hub health check

[bento]

I pulled the rear hub flanges tonight so I can get longer studs pressed in. I expected this to be a PITA, but both sides came off easy, real easy. Too easy?

Both sides went exactly the same;

Removed cotter pin while car was on the ground. Noted that driver side pin was nearly new. I may have replaced this when I got the car. I don't recall now.

Broke loose both hub nuts with a 3' breaker bar. Arm strength was enough. Much easier than I remember the crank pulley nut being, but comparable to a lug nut through an 18" breaker bar.

Jacked up the car, removed wheels & drums.

Both hub nuts spun off smoothly and easily. Once off, I saw that the threads were freshly greased up.

Seeing how easily the nuts unthreaded, I decided to see if I could pull the hub flanges. They came right off by hand and the splines were also greased up with what looked like fairly fresh grease.

That seemed too easy. All of this took 30 minutes. I've been procrastinating on this project for months based on the threads I've seen on the topic making it out to be much worse. Shouldn't these take some work with a puller to remove? Or is that only on a 40 year old dry fit that's corroded over the years?

Pictures:

This is just one side. Other side looks the same. They look fine to me but I'm not sure I know what I'm looking for.

No excess play was noted by me or two mechanics who have gone over the car thoroughly in the last month or two and everything spun nicely when I had the axles out for reconditioning fall 2014.

[TobyB]

Looks fine so far.

 

The other places to look are the hub flange itself, where it presses against the inner bearing race,

and the sleeve in between the bearings.

 

if it's ever loosened up, those surfaces wear, and the spacer wear will kill the bearings, as it messes

up the setup depth.  If you do the setup procedure in the FSM, you'll end up with a .020" thinner spacer

and it'll work ok.

 

hth

 

t

[bento]

Thanks Toby. Here's the other side of the hub where it presses against the bearing.

These must've been replaced in the not too distant past. Remnants of the part label is still present.

So removing the flange by hand doesn't sound like an issue? Hub bearings show no play and spun smoothly when I last had the axles out.

[TobyB]

...that looks beautiful... <snif>

 

hee

 

t

[bento]

Awesome. I'll just consider myself fortunate and go back to getting those longer studs pressed in. The studs were recommended by Westwerks when they did the PCA/BMWCCA inspections. I bought them a while ago, knowing I was right at 8 turns of engagement, but procrastinated until they called it out.

I think this was the first project that was actually easier than I expected going in.

Thanks again.

[bento]

Patrick pressed out the old studs and pressed in the new ones for me. I got everything reassembled without a hitch.

Yup, those should be long enough. I'm debating whether I should cut them down so I can run the covers. I might look into center cap options as well.

[M3M3]

...that looks beautiful... <snif>

 

hee

 

t

yep.  those splines look just like they are supposed to!