I am having trouble with the front wheel bearings spinning on the spindle, mainly the outer bearing. I replaced the right steering knuckle and it shows some slight wear the last time i had it apart but now the left side is showing a good bit of wear.. Sometimes when I turn very sharp to get into a parking spot i hear a screeching sound from one of the front wheels. I am guessing that in a sharp turn is when the inner bearing race is spinning on the spindle..

This is a 1988 E150 van but i am posting here because the older trucks used king pins like my van. i posted this in the van section but no one seemed to have experienced this problem..

i have a gravel driveway and have to back up and turn sharply into the turn around area daily as well as fairly sharp to head out forward. AS you now the wheels tilt at quite a bit of an angle when they are turned all of the way. I am guessing that causes a lot of pressure on the bearings..

i have used National and Timpken bearings. I put grease on the spindle bearing surface as well as hand pack the bearings with the red high temp grease until the grease comes out the opposite side. My Ford service manual says to torque the spindle nut to 22-25ft lbs while turning the rotor the opposite direction and then back the retaining nut off 1/8th of a turn. I have used the manual method as well as just by feel and neither has worked...

The radius arm bushings, axle pivot bushings only have about 30k miles on them and the king pins are tight as well as all of the tie trod ends and drag link.
So hoping may you guys might be able to shed some light on this problem..
Thanks
Anna

 

Why are you greasing the spindle? In the old way I was taught, we had cotter pins and we tightened until all play was gone, then backed off to the first chance for a cotter pin. You would use the D hole washer and adjust the nut as you did to provide running clearance for the rollers, but I was taught to pack the bearing, but to leave the inner part of inner race that rides on the spindle ... and spindle dry of grease. Just wipe it and slide the bearing on, any slight grease film is more than enough to prevent rust.

The weight of the vehicle on the spindle should limit the bearing race spinning on it when there is a nice free spinning bearing there. I never had good bearings spin the races on a spindle though. ​​​​​​​

Have you examined the outer race that is in the hub for bad spots that make the rollers want to stop rolling smoothly ?

Are the retaining nuts locking to the threads good to hold adjustment ?

 

I've always taken a sharp center punch and put a nice divot at about four places around the spindle where the bearing seats. depending on how loose your bearing is, you could add a few more.

 

Thanks for the reply and advice. I started using grease on the spindles after I noticed the bearings wearing on them. It didn't seem to make any difference though.

My dad had a garage when i was growing up and he taught me how to do brakes. I was taught to tighten the bearings about the same as you were. I only started following the manual and torquing them after this problem started.

I have always changed the races when installing new bearings and i use a aluminum bearing race instillation tool so I don't damage the inside of the races. I did find one that looked suspicious on the outer surface though inside one of the duralast rotors. That is an idea to think about, damaged bearing races... or cheap rotors and the inside of the rotor where the bearing race is driven in is not perfectly round or has a bad spot that could distort the race? i don't know and am getting frustrated with this. Since new steering knuckles cant be bought i bought a set of used ones and had them shipped to me. They had a little rust on them so I need to clean them and have a machine shop check them for bearing clearance and install new king pin bushings if they check out..

 

I just never heard or seen evidence of an inner wheel bearing race spinning on a spindle shaft except when a bearing ran dry or was set too tight and the bearing seized up as it welding itself. Good luck. Are you sure it spinning on the spindle with the weight of the vehicle on it.

 

here is some more pics. The only reason the bearing is dry in the pic is because I cleaned it to see what it looked like.

 

My races would spin in the hub. I peened it as suggested earlier in the thread. Don’t know I would feel good about those stress concentrations on the spindle though.

 

I don't see any issue, they have clearance so that you can freely adjust preload or remove to service, etc. In use as you turn the steering, the races may move a little on the spindle but that's normal and will leave signs of contact, but if those inner races were turning on those spindle shafts under load, they'd likely be welded on or have welded themselves and twisted off. If made a press fit so no clearance, you could't adjust running cleatance with the nut as the inner race would not freely move. There is no reason to use a punch on a spindle shaft or bearing race.

 

The only real fix it to replace the spindles the bearings have worn them.

But in reality the bearings usually turn very slow on the spindle when this happens and it takes a long time to get worse. as tbear says you can't do much about it or you won't be able to adjust them properly and that will cause problems.

 

I kind of like the theory regarding the hub being out of round. It could make the inner race “walk” around the spindle. A 31” tire will have ~672 revolutions per mile. Even if the bearing is only moving a half thou per bump, it will still walk around the spindle over time.

You might try to find a machine shop that can measure TIR on the inner and outer bearing race bores in the hub.

Also, I’ve had some luck with bearing retaining compounds. Different formulation than the usual red or blue Loctite but same idea.

Michael

 

Thanks for all of the replies and I am learning a lot.
The pics have been from the original spindles. Originally it was only the right spindle. I thought I got lucky as I found what was supposed to be a NOS right spindle but after receiving it, I believe it was take off. It did appear to have brand new king pin bushings in it but there was some damage in the shoulder where the seal rides. It appears a lot like someone may have used a chisel trying to get a inner bearing off. Also it is hard to tell if a bearing was ever spinning on it because it is old and had been cleaned up a bit.



Here is a pic of that


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So i used a small buffing wheel in a battery drill and come compound to smooth out the surface where the seal rides while being careful not to take off too much material..


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Got it all back together with new rotor, bearings, caliper, pads, everything!


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Ok so now when i was doing the work I used a loaner 1/2 drive torque wrench from the parts store. When I would torque the bearing to around 22ft lbs i would hear a pop or snap sound. I took the bearing back to NAPA and got a SKF bearing from them and installed it. It seemed to work find. Again I followed the manual specs.
About 3000 miles later I took the wheel off for inspection and here is what I found.

This is the outer bearings with the red high temp grease


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This is the inner bearing with the grease wiped off. The beveled lip was a mark up for something else so pay no attention to it.




Notice the red grease has gotten hot and turned dark. i am guessing either the bearings were spinning on the spindle or they were torqued too tight. I mentioned a loaner torque wrench and have found them to be off before because they get abused..

Here is what the NOS replacement spindle looked like after I took the bearings off and cleaned it up. If there was any rotation it was slight.. So I replaced the bearings again and this time used my 3/8 drive inch lb beam style torque wrench and torqued the bearings to spec. I am leaving the hubcaps off so I have easy access to the bearing caps for quick inspection to see if the grease is overheating.


If you notice the NOS spindle in the above pic and then the original spindle in the earlier pics, the original spindle is black in between the two bearing surfaces where the NOS spindle appears like it might have been rusty and cleaned up at one time..
Not having the original specs for the size of the spindle shafts makes it difficult to check them with micrometers that I am not good at reading anyway!

So I have the two used spindles sent to me this week and they have a 30 day return. I need to clean them up and inspect them and see if I can find the clearance specs required with a new bearing..

As to retaining compound... I talked to a rep at loctite and he recommended 660 bearing retainer. He said that I would have about 30 minutes to work with it before it sets up. The bearings wold have to be packed and then the inner race cleaned spotless as well as the spindle bearing surface. I forgot the actual specs but the said the rotational strength is quite high and the 660 was made to fill in gaps where the shaft is worn.
As to getting the rotor and bearings off again, one would need a puller and probably have to heat the bearing.. He said that the rotational strength was very strong but pulling to the side was not and it would break loose. So one would need to pull the outer bearing using a puller to the rotor and center of the spindle shaft. That would leave the rear bearing and seal behind on the spindle and would be much easier to remove.

Ideally would be to have a small key-way machined into the spindle and inner bearing race but the inner bearing race is thin and there is probably no extra to safely remove..

if you used a center punch and went around the spindle, you would still have to have enough clearance for the bearing to be adjusted. I have read about people doing this on trailer axles.

So apparently i am not the only one with this problem.... I drove this van 30k on pavement with out issues but apparently for some reason or something i am doing wrong, this just isn't working!

I don't know of anything in the front end suspension that could cause this. My tires are one size over from the recommended size on the door sticker but that shouldn't do it as you see these trucks with much bigger tires..

Well again thanks for the help. Sorry if this post got a bit long but wanted you to have as much info as possible...

Thanks
Anna

 

here is a pic from the inside of one of the aftermarket rotors from O or AZ store Notice the cuts inside where the bearing race is supposed to be?
The rotors are still under warranty but i am tempted to just forget it and order a couple of Motorcraft rotors. i understand that even the Motorcraft rotors are made in China now!
But also if the cut at the bottom of where the bearing race is supposed to be driven down flush, if it isn't perfect then the race wouldn't be flat and i could see that causing issues..

 

You're 100% correct on the eventual outcome of that. Your best option is to put a set of rotors in the hands of a machinist to insure they're the way they were originally engineered. The spindles could also be repaired by a machinist also by turning the seal and bearing surfaces down to accommodate a bushing which would bring these surfaces back into the original OEM specs.

 

As far as grease, use only grease that meets Ford specs. It will be written on the can: "meets Ford-Lincoln-Mercury specs".https://www.napaonline.com/en/p/VAL6...ressionRank=34

 

Quote:

Ok so now when i was doing the work I used a loaner 1/2 drive torque wrench from the parts store. When I would torque the bearing to around 22ft lbs i would hear a pop or snap sound.

You know that is the torque wrench telling you that the value set has been reached?