Removing rear wheel bearings.

[Dudeland]

13 hours ago, M3This said:

what if you no longer have the shims? Can you order new ones from BMW? 

Yes. 

 

[Dudeland]

In the FWIW department, I did the rear bearings, just for peace of mind.  I kept the shims on each side, torqued them down(it takes a lot) and it worked out fine (put 5K miles on it ). 

 

 

[M3This]

How do you know if they need the shims or not? I looked on realoem.com and looks like there are (3) different shim sizes as well. 

 

I had not idea about the shims when I took the rear arms apart for powder coating, I think I might have them still but no clue which one went on which side. 

[tech71]

7 hours ago, M3This said:

I had not idea about the shims when I took the rear arms apart for powder coating, I think I might have them still but no clue which one went on which side. 

Oh   my, that was a boo boo, pretty big one at that, best if you find them.

Going to have to do some measuring and arithmetic now, pretty critical to get the shims right so any play is with in specs when its torqued.

Did you install new bearings?

Looks complicated but really not so much, but you will need a 6 in. digital caliper.

 

Quote

 

Edited May 17, 2023 by tech71

[tech71]

On 5/16/2023 at 10:34 AM, M3This said:

How do you know if they need the shims or not?

Oh you need one....two actually

unless the spacers were custom made to fit

Edited July 1, 2023 by tech71

[M3This]

On 5/16/2023 at 6:56 PM, tech71 said:

Oh you need one....two actually

Sorry for the late reply guys. I found the bag of bearings from when the rear was disassembled and it has every part but shims. It appears that one of the previous owners never had shims in the rear. 

[tzei]

Check if they’re jammed in t/arms (or goo fused in bearings).

[tech71]

24 minutes ago, tzei said:

Check if they’re jammed in t/arms (or goo fused in bearings).

Does kind of look like they may be stuck on the bearing races.

Yucky!

First, did you stuff everything from both sides into 1 bag? If so you did yourself no favors here.

Second, clean all the stuff up including the bores, like our friend from Finland said.. shims are probably still there.

If you are lucky, shims and  spacers are all the same dimensions, will save you some grief.

If not, its still doable but will require more time, careful measuring with a dial caliper and some arithmetic to get them right. They need to be correct if you want it all to last more than a few thousand miles.

If I may make an observation here...being a little more forearmed with information/data either from the Blue Book/Haynes or this forum would have saved you a buttload of aggravation,

Just sayin 😉

Edited June 25, 2023 by tech71

[Hans]

First, see its your lucky day and they are the same.....

[M3This]

4 hours ago, tech71 said:

Does kind of look like they may be stuck on the bearing races.

Yucky!

First, did you stuff everything from both sides into 1 bag? If so you did yourself no favors here.

Second, clean all the stuff up including the bores, like our friend from Finland said.. shims are probably still there.

If you are lucky, shims and  spacers are all the same dimensions, will save you some grief.

If not, its still doable but will require more time, careful measuring with a dial caliper and some arithmetic to get them right. They need to be correct if you want it all to last more than a few thousand miles.

If I may make an observation here...being a little more forearmed with information/data either from the Blue Book/Haynes or this forum would have saved you a buttload of aggravation,

Just sayin 😉

yeah unfortunately everything went in the same bag. When I first got my car I stripped it to the bare shell over the first two weekends that I had it and sent it off for dipping 

 

I didn’t disassemble the subframe intil it was off the car and because it was off the car and I didn’t have the proper tools I couldn’t get the stub axels out so I took them to a shop and they pressed them out of the arms and they put everything in one freezer bag. 
 

Not the only dumb move I have made on this project so far, but you live and learn. 
 

the shims are not in the arms as I checked the arms prior to sending out to powder coating. I did clean up the bearings, spacer sleeves and seals and no shims. 🤦🏻‍♂️

 

 

 

 

 

I also noticed that there is some damage on the edge of one of the spacer sleeves so will probably replace that. 
 

Also one of the seals was silver and all the rest are black so im guessing that was replaced at a different time during one point of the cars life as it’s in the worst shape as the rubber is falling off. 

Edited June 26, 2023 by M3This

[tech71]

16 hours ago, M3This said:

I also noticed that there is some damage on the edge of one of the spacer sleeves so will probably replace that. 

The damage includes a crack and looks fresh. Sketchy shop perhaps.

I dont know... still seems unlikely to me that the car drove around for any length of time without those shims being installed, maybe the shop lost them. 

Are you ordering new bearings? I would order new bearings, seals, spacers and do the measuring/math so you have an idea what thickness shims to order, appears to be 5 sizes still  available 

 

Edited June 26, 2023 by tech71

[M3This]

23 hours ago, tech71 said:

The damage includes a crack and looks fresh. Sketchy shop perhaps.

I dont know... still seems unlikely to me that the car drove around for any length of time without those shims being installed, maybe the shop lost them. 

Are you ordering new bearings? I would order new bearings, seals, spacers and do the measuring/math so you have an idea what thickness shims to order, appears to be 5 sizes still  available 

 

 

Yeah Ill order all new stuff for everything and then measure using the guide you posted above. Thanks for the help and I'll keep this thread up to date on how it goes. 

[M3This]

Anyone know where you can order new sleeves. Looks like they are EOL with BMW. 

[TobyB]

Soooo...

 

what you have there is a mess.  Both of those sleeves show signs of previous failure.

 

Take a look at the inner faces of your hubs, where they compress against the inner races

of the outer ball bearings, and see if they're flat.  Then see if there's ANY wiggle when installed on the stubs-

you'll need to get them to the position at which they ride when assembled.  If the hubs won't slide

onto the stubs of their own accord, it's probably safe to assume they're ok- IF the stub splines don't show 

any visible wear.

 

At this point in the project, you might be able to find another set of assembled trailing arms.

Or buy the parts secondhand.

Worst case, you can have sleeves made by a machinist, but that'll be relatively expensive.

On the up side, you can have them made to match your trailing arms, and have one of the few

cars out there that DOESN'T need any shims.

 

t

at about a half- century, parts procurement starts to include the "well, guess I can make one" option.

[kbmb02]

Surface grinding a shim to spec (and yeah - per @TobyB - one can also machine the sleeve to clean up and then the shims to make it all work (wondering if the sleeves are surface-hardened or through-hardened...)). -KB