I figured I would put this in since its going to be happening to more and more of us as the cars age.
Read ALL of this before attempting, I jump around a lot.
Anywho, my drivers side front bearing started to grind and howl at me. Time for a replacement.
Took the car down to a few mechanics. "lets see here... thats 280 for the part and then another 120 in labor.. to a total of 400 bucks there pal"
this was not the dealership (they quoted 600 something off the top of their heads) this was your average low cost tuffy.
yeah.. right before christmas.. umm no thanks.
And thats when your favorite mad scientist declared:
"WTF!"
and then I said:
"hey wait a minute, I have a set of tools at my place, and I am all sorts of smart and stuff, i think.. ooh look something shiny.. where was I.. oh yeah.. wheel bearing."
Anyway I started to ask around. seems rockauto.com carried the part from timken for about 189 (before shipping this heavy ass thing). thats a lot better than 280 but not good enough. I never trust timken anyway.. why is that you say.. oh yeah.. wait.. I have changed out the front bearings on my front wheel drive 97 grand prix gtp before and used timken parts.. which failed.. like a year later.. and I had to do it again.. which is annoying.
But never fail. the powers of google and ebay come to the rescue.
I discover pam's auto. its a salvage company.
and guess what.. they have a front wheel hub bearing assembly from a 2005 cadillac cts with just 30k miles on it.
now, before you go "using USED parts! are you nuts?!??!#$#@%$%@#!?"
One, nuts? sometimes.
Two, the timken will be lucky if it lasts 30k, the oem I KNOW will last over 100k, and it was just 89 dollars, total of 109 shipped. woot!
okay, onto the fun.
to get to the wheel bearing you of course have to jack the car up.
remove the wheel.
ooh pretty (ugly).
you have to now remove the brake caliper braket. Not the caliper itself, the braket that the caliper is attached to.
This involves two large bolts at the back, I am sure you will find them, one on top, one below.
Now.. you better have a fine set of tools, and a breaker bar, cause these things were put in there TIGHT, with lock tight.
after much straining, swearing and a busted knuckle they will indeed turn.
(mental note, you are turning "down" on both bolts to get them to loosen up)
with these out you can now shimmy, curse at, hit with a hammer, and then lever off the caliper with bracket attached. JOY!
You may have to compress the pistons later to get the caliper back on the rotor, I just jammed and slid it back on and it went fine. took a bit of trying though.
now for more fun.
remove the rotor..
oh yeah.. there is this lame torque star nut holding it on. make sure you have the right bit for this as you can strip it out pretty easily.
once that is off you should be able to remove the rotor..
won't come off you say? oh yeah, its probably rust welded to the spindle.
take a bfh (big F ing hammer) and swat the back side till it loosens up.
take it off, put it aside.
now for more fun.
on the back of the wheel bearing (the thing in the center) there are three big bolts holding it on.
you thought the caliper bolts were a pain? meet their big brother, or bigger, meaner, fatter sister with self esteem problems.
Now you can get the bottom two off in the space given to you but the third (top) bolt is right by the linkage for the sway bar.
take another jack (what you don't have two?) and put it under the spindle.
jack the spindle up till there is no pressure on the bolt that holds the sway bar to the linkage thingy.
then you can take your socket or whatever and an alan wrench and take that nut off, then slide the bolt out and manuever it out of the way.
this will give you enough room to get your wrench in there and take that last bastard out (I was bleeding a little at this point)
JOY!
wait..the wheel bearing won't slide out...
duh!
you can take your hammer and smack it out, the back will probably stay in there, just poke or jam at from behind till that plate comes out. no biggie.
the aluminum just welded to the spindle. it happens. you are throwing out that bearing anyway.
OH, you will probably want to disconnect the speed sensor as well. Pinch the top and then press it through. joy.
Take the new wheel bearing and line it up and start to slide it in.
The sensor wire should be in the upper left hand as you go in.
Line up the holes, use a hammer to manuever it back and forth a bit and then put the bolts back, re attach the sway bar, and then put the rotor on with the retention bolt, then the caliper bracket with caliper, make sure everything is nice and tight and then remove the jack under the spindle, then put the wheel back on and lower the car.
joy.
you just spent about 100 buck on a job that was quoted at 400.
Read ALL of this before attempting, I jump around a lot.
Anywho, my drivers side front bearing started to grind and howl at me. Time for a replacement.
Took the car down to a few mechanics. "lets see here... thats 280 for the part and then another 120 in labor.. to a total of 400 bucks there pal"
this was not the dealership (they quoted 600 something off the top of their heads) this was your average low cost tuffy.
yeah.. right before christmas.. umm no thanks.
And thats when your favorite mad scientist declared:
"WTF!"
and then I said:
"hey wait a minute, I have a set of tools at my place, and I am all sorts of smart and stuff, i think.. ooh look something shiny.. where was I.. oh yeah.. wheel bearing."
Anyway I started to ask around. seems rockauto.com carried the part from timken for about 189 (before shipping this heavy ass thing). thats a lot better than 280 but not good enough. I never trust timken anyway.. why is that you say.. oh yeah.. wait.. I have changed out the front bearings on my front wheel drive 97 grand prix gtp before and used timken parts.. which failed.. like a year later.. and I had to do it again.. which is annoying.
But never fail. the powers of google and ebay come to the rescue.
I discover pam's auto. its a salvage company.
and guess what.. they have a front wheel hub bearing assembly from a 2005 cadillac cts with just 30k miles on it.
now, before you go "using USED parts! are you nuts?!??!#$#@%$%@#!?"
One, nuts? sometimes.
Two, the timken will be lucky if it lasts 30k, the oem I KNOW will last over 100k, and it was just 89 dollars, total of 109 shipped. woot!
okay, onto the fun.
to get to the wheel bearing you of course have to jack the car up.
remove the wheel.
ooh pretty (ugly).
you have to now remove the brake caliper braket. Not the caliper itself, the braket that the caliper is attached to.
This involves two large bolts at the back, I am sure you will find them, one on top, one below.
Now.. you better have a fine set of tools, and a breaker bar, cause these things were put in there TIGHT, with lock tight.
after much straining, swearing and a busted knuckle they will indeed turn.
(mental note, you are turning "down" on both bolts to get them to loosen up)
with these out you can now shimmy, curse at, hit with a hammer, and then lever off the caliper with bracket attached. JOY!
You may have to compress the pistons later to get the caliper back on the rotor, I just jammed and slid it back on and it went fine. took a bit of trying though.
now for more fun.
remove the rotor..
oh yeah.. there is this lame torque star nut holding it on. make sure you have the right bit for this as you can strip it out pretty easily.
once that is off you should be able to remove the rotor..
won't come off you say? oh yeah, its probably rust welded to the spindle.
take a bfh (big F ing hammer) and swat the back side till it loosens up.
take it off, put it aside.
now for more fun.
on the back of the wheel bearing (the thing in the center) there are three big bolts holding it on.
you thought the caliper bolts were a pain? meet their big brother, or bigger, meaner, fatter sister with self esteem problems.
Now you can get the bottom two off in the space given to you but the third (top) bolt is right by the linkage for the sway bar.
take another jack (what you don't have two?) and put it under the spindle.
jack the spindle up till there is no pressure on the bolt that holds the sway bar to the linkage thingy.
then you can take your socket or whatever and an alan wrench and take that nut off, then slide the bolt out and manuever it out of the way.
this will give you enough room to get your wrench in there and take that last bastard out (I was bleeding a little at this point)
JOY!
wait..the wheel bearing won't slide out...
duh!
you can take your hammer and smack it out, the back will probably stay in there, just poke or jam at from behind till that plate comes out. no biggie.
the aluminum just welded to the spindle. it happens. you are throwing out that bearing anyway.
OH, you will probably want to disconnect the speed sensor as well. Pinch the top and then press it through. joy.
Take the new wheel bearing and line it up and start to slide it in.
The sensor wire should be in the upper left hand as you go in.
Line up the holes, use a hammer to manuever it back and forth a bit and then put the bolts back, re attach the sway bar, and then put the rotor on with the retention bolt, then the caliper bracket with caliper, make sure everything is nice and tight and then remove the jack under the spindle, then put the wheel back on and lower the car.
joy.
you just spent about 100 buck on a job that was quoted at 400.