Rear Bearign Rebuild
near you will help if you have a problem too.Turtle- Those Timken seals- are they angled or straight? I haven't used them and would be curious to see what they look like.
Gary





thanks guys, i think i got it now the dimension we are shooting for is the distance between the outer races in bearing housing.....so all setups will be unique in their exact dimensions due to manufactuing tolerances in the bearing housings .
I have a couple of arms here to rebuild, I'll look over the spindles and let you know. I had some old spindles but returned them to the owners once the job was shipped.
It would be pretty cool if Marck could use his solidworks program to show a cutaway drawing of an assembled rear spindle.
Last edited by goinbroke; Dec 27, 2005 at 02:43 PM.
If thats the case the spindle either would be locked solid or have a bunch of slop once torqued down. Whenever i put mine back together with the existing shims you actually couldn't feel any play at all but not tight enough not to be able to turn by hand.

Back in '97 when I bought the car it had a bent TA. Since I had it apart to replace the TA I figured I'd put new bearings in it. These were factory bearings as the rotor rivets were still there and had loosened to 0.008. I replaced them with a set of SKF bearings (Swedish quality!) and with the original shim end-play was 0.004. Not perfect but back then I didn't know of the 0.001 goal and was happy to be in spec. I drove it like that until about a year ago when I redid both trailing arms and shimed them to 0.001.
The Best of Corvette for Corvette Enthusiasts
If thats the case the spindle either would be locked solid or have a bunch of slop once torqued down. Whenever i put mine back together with the existing shims you actually couldn't feel any play at all but not tight enough not to be able to turn by hand.
Last edited by goinbroke; Dec 27, 2005 at 03:31 PM.

Back in '97 when I bought the car it had a bent TA. Since I had it apart to replace the TA I figured I'd put new bearings in it. These were factory bearings as the rotor rivets were still there and had loosened to 0.008. I replaced them with a set of SKF bearings (Swedish quality!) and with the original shim end-play was 0.004. Not perfect but back then I didn't know of the 0.001 goal and was happy to be in spec. I drove it like that until about a year ago when I redid both trailing arms and shimed them to 0.001.
I should say too these are precision ball bearings with an APEC rating of 7 so they're not the same as the Timken or TRW's. BTW those TRW might have been just a bad set, I haven't used them before? I'll stay with the Timkens as long as I can still get them.Gary
Last edited by gtr1999; Dec 27, 2005 at 08:04 PM.
Here is the "custom tool" I used with my press- any guesses?

Here's another view, I did have to bore out the ID to clear the shoulder on the spindle.

Gary
What is this tool used for ?
When you torque the spindle down to 100 ftlbs won’t that pull the bearing down?
When you press it on, how do you judge the bearing is fully seated without applying too much force?
The bearings are press fit to the spindle- unless you slip fit them. I'm not going to go there here, I press fit them.
With the setup tool the bearings will slide on without a problem. Then toruqe to 100 ft/lb to check/set the end play.
Once you get the endplay set then you grease them and install. I press the bearing on while I have a hand on the arm. I can feel when the press is stopped and the bearing is home. I rotate the arm at the same time to be sure there is no binding. When you get the brg's pressed on the nut with take up small amounts to the final set point. I don't like to load the spindle threads pressing the bearing on with the nut. When you hit 100 ft/lbs you may have to go beyond to align the cotter pin hole. I always spin the spindle after reaching the hole alignment to be sure the still is not binding. It should spin smooth,not as fast as it was before because of the new grease,brg's,and tighter end play but NO binding should be felt.
Gary
As Received***************After sanding
Min-Max=Diff ************Min-Max=Diff
0.145-0.146=0.001******0.1424 -0.1438=0.0014
0.141-0.142 =0.001*****0.1389-0.1391=0.0002
0.133-0.134=0.001******0.1312-0.1317=0.0005
0.125-0.126= 0.001*****0.1238-0.126=0.0022
0.1225-0.1233=0.0008 ***0.1208-0.122=0.0012
0.1148-0.1158=0.001*****0.1142-0.1148=0.0006
0.107-0.1078=0.0008 ****0.1061-0.1069=0.0008
0.1035-0.1045=0.001*****0.103-0.1035=0.0005
Forgot to write down*****.0948-.0952=0.0004
Since the goal is .001 bearing play I decided to see if I could pull it in a little tighter by sanding them on a flat surface using 400 wet sand paper. On two instances it made it worse.
Two questions I have:
1) Should I be doing this?
2) Do you surface grind them first ?
3) Is the procedure I am using for sanding correct?
OOPs that was three questions
Thanks
Carl
Last edited by ckerch; Jan 15, 2006 at 08:52 AM.













