tire wear, wheel bearings

[Larry Martin]

Twice now, during the safety lane checks on the car, the "mechanic" has said there was loose play in the vertical test.  Each time I told the guy to show me and, to tell the truth, there was some slight movement (no noise of any kind though) on the right front.  And both times I told them to tighten the end nut to torque spec which is 150#.  After the look of shock and disappointment left his face, no further "problem" so no wheel bearing repair.  Maybe, even with the cotter pin in, there is some stretching going on over the years in the stub or ?  I did have one actual wheel bearing go bad on the left front about ten years ago but it was loud and obvious.

Larry Martin

Date: Monday, November 22, 2010, 8:43 AM

If you still have the axle nut tight, the hub will be tight, even with a dead bearing.  One of the front bearings on my B13 was dead, and it was still tight when I moved it.  Once I removed the brake and took the axle nut off, the hub fell of the car.  It was making a ton of noise, but did not wiggle.


Eric Waterman

On Sat, Nov 20, 2010 at 8:49 PM, Matt McCrary <mattmccrary at gmail.com> wrote:

Bad wheel bearings will sometimes pass the "vertical axis" test, at least the completely shot rear wheel bearings on my B13 did.

_________matt mccrary

On Nov 20, 2010, at 8:14 PM, David Pertuz <davidpertuz at mindspring.com> wrote:


No, there's no play in anything. It sounds quite bad, and if a wheel bearing is so bad that it sounds like it does (I mean, it's not roaring like a lion but it's not hard to miss, either) I'd think it would have play, too - but no. That's part of the reason for my doubt about a diagnosis. There is also a bit of a vibration from the front end (apparent front right), and I can feel it in the form of a 'bump' at very low speeds, too. Like 2Hz @10mph or so. I've no other reason to think my wheel(s) are out of balance, and besides I just rotated them and took the car out for a drive and no change, really. So I am still not left with anything better than a wheel bearing.


Also, when I rotated the tires I could see that the rear tires also have a similar wear pattern - a bit extra on the inside 1.5cm or so, slight feathering. So I don't think any wear pattern on the RF is related to the front end issue.


David

-----Original Message-----

From: Tim Rogers 

Sent: Nov 20, 2010 7:32 PM

To: 

Cc: se-r list 

Subject: Re: tire wear, wheel bearings



The "wub-wub-wub" makes it "sound" like wheel bearings.
If you jack up the front and try to rock the front wheels along the vertical axis, do you get any play?

Tim Rogers



On Sat, Nov 20, 2010 at 1:11 PM, David Pertuz <davidpertuz at mindspring.com> wrote:


Hi y'all,



My tire-wear-reading kung-fu is pretty rusty, as pretty well-sorted cars

mean I've not had to do any in years.



On my G20, RF tire has noticeable additional wear on the inside 1.5cm or

so of tread - not really severe, but enough to notice. An additional

bevel, with slight concavity. LF tire has normal wear but very slight

additional wear and very slight cupping on the inside inch - this is

consistent with the strong left pull that I've had for a while.



LF tire is not a mystery - it's the RF I'm not sure about. The car seems

to have an obviously bad RF (or RR?) wheel bearing - by sound, anyway.

There is the hum-roar under load, some wub-wub-wub. I need to take care

of this ASAP (I wish I could do this without an arbor press, but of

course I don't have one, so I need to find a place to take it to) but

I'm  abit unsure of the diagnosis since the apparent source of sounds

can be tricky and nothing is bad enough that it is mechanically loose

when you tug on the wheel.



Tie rod ends are probably OK but I think I'll replace them soon anyway.

Front end feels fine in terms of tightness but it's got 165k so it won't

hurt. Tie rod ends car cause toe issues and related wear, but the wear

on the RF tire does not suggest toe to me due to the pull to the other

side.



Thoughts?



David

Chicago

+----------------------------------------------------------------------+

The mailing list home page is http://www.se-r-list.org/

To modify your subscription, go to http://www.se-r-list.org/mailman/listinfo/se-r





+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
The mailing list home page is http://www.se-r-list.org/

To modify your subscription, go to http://www.se-r-list.org/mailman/listinfo/se-r

+----------------------------------------------------------------------+

The mailing list home page is http://www.se-r-list.org/

To modify your subscription, go to http://www.se-r-list.org/mailman/listinfo/se-r



-----Inline Attachment Follows-----

+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
The mailing list home page is http://www.se-r-list.org/
To modify your subscription, go to http://www.se-r-list.org/mailman/listinfo/se-r
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://www.se-r-list.org/pipermail/se-r/attachments/20101122/21669d54/attachment.html