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I recently put my blue truck on the lift to check some stuff out and found my front driver side wheel has some noticeable play in it (Compared to the other side). Seemingly all in the bearing since I only see movement in the axle shaft on the back of the steering knuckle when I wiggle the tire.
I replaced both bearings when I rebuilt the front end last summer. I’ve kept the bearings well lubricated. No offloading. Just city and highway driving.
I’m thinking the play is either in the bearings themselves or the bearings are moving in the knuckle.
And since the bearings are only a year old I’m learn more towards the latter. Which would suck as I’m sure replacement steering knuckles are hard to come by.
Anyway, the truck itself drives fine, no noises or wondering.. Too be honest I’m not worried about anything falling part or anything like that, I’m mainly concerned about long term wear. If the bearings moving around inside the bore of the knuckle while driving down a bumpy road.
If I’m right the damage is already done, probably was before I bought the truck, I just didn't’ notice until now. Especially before with the shot ball joints.. I would have never noticed.
Of course this is all speculation from a worry wart. I can’t know for sure unless I get some more information and take the thing back part (not going to lie, I really don’t want to.)
Is there a bearing end-play specs for these? I don’t see anything in my books. All I see is the axle nut being torqued to 100ft lbs and the cap retainer bolts to 30 ft lbs. Which I did during the install.
I uploaded a video on YouTube to better show what I’m talking about. Sorry for the shaking.
Oh, I have a additional concern about the bearings.
There is a difference between the napa set and the National A22 from O’Reillys.
The napa bearings I installed on my red truck have an inner and other cone spacer. The A22s only have a outer cone spacer and I’m not sure why this is.
One of the original bearings sets in my red truck only had a outer spacer. I just figured someone had been in it before and forgot the inner spacer but, after I purchased the A22s for the blue truck I just assumed some manufacturer include them and some don't. I don't’ know if that's the problem but, I wish I would have returned those bearings and got the napa ones but, I was limited on time.
I've had that happen once and the outer bearing retainer failed, I replaced it with a new one but I cant remember replacing the outer bearing at that time, it was twenty plus years ago.
Iowan do you recall in what way the retainer itself failed? Did it wear down or crack or something else?
I suppose the only thing I can do is replace the bearing with the napa set and check the retainer cap for damage. If that doesn't fix it my knuckle must be gone.
I don't think it could be the hub, those bearings pressed on pretty tight.
Might just be the knuckle might be worn.
Is there a way to insert some 'shim stock' to tighten things up a little bit?
Like you said, It's not a lot of movement, But if it's enough to hear it knock, that just concerns me, or tells me that it has to much movement for my liking.
The top side is getting all the load, I'm surprised you cant see it when it's fit together?
Might just be the knuckle might be worn.
Is there a way to insert some 'shim stock' to tighten things up a little bit?
Like you said, It's not a lot of movement, But if it's enough to hear it knock, that just concerns me, or tells me that it has to much movement for my liking.
The top side is getting all the load, I'm surprised you cant see it when it's fit together?
I'll look into the shim stock if it comes to that. That sounds way better than trying to get another knuckle.
This next time I'll slide the new bearings into knuckle to check their fitment before pressing them onto the hub. Although, if I do have to use shim stock, if I understand correctly that probably means I would have to install the hub the hard way by first installing the bearings and shim into the knuckle, install the retainer and then beating the hub back into the bearings.
Or are you talking about add shims to the existing bearing spacers so the retainer clamps them tighter?
It would depend on if the clearance was: Bearing to Knuckle or Bearing to Spindle.... My assumption is that the clearance is more in the Knuckle to bearing, that would be a tight fit and the retainer would hopefully hold it in place to some extent.
I been giving it some more thought and I think I'm going to wait on this repair. I don't really have the time and plus I really believe it's the knuckle thats worn so, I think I'm going to plan for this repair and source a replacement knuckle so I can fix it right if worse comes to worse when I tear into it.
[update] I got this fixed. I caused this issue by using an oring with too big a cross-section under the retainer cap. I removed the oring and use rtv instead and that removed the play in the bearing. [/update]
07-07-2018, 10:16 AM
