My Excursion has proved to be a reliable winter vehicle, as was the intention. A few weeks back, at 116,000 miles, the right front wheel bearing started to squeal around left turns. Not very loud, so I didn't think it was all that bad, just an indication it was going. I jacked up the front of the truck anyway for good measure, and found a tremendous amount of slop in the bearing. Yeah, the bearing had disintegrated. Time for a replacement.

I bought a new replacement hub off of eBay, and proceeded to start tearing into the thing. Should be an easy repair...

Right.

The repair itself is actually straightforward, but I had a few little snags get in my way. The one I'm facing now is that the new hub did not come with replacement studs, and the old hub's studs will not come out. Yes, I tried using a torch (and failed). I got one removed, only to find it's a fine thread and possibly Metric. Either way, it's not something that they have at Lowes.

Does anyone have an idea where to get more of these, or what the size is so I can order some from McMaster? I looked through the GenuineFordParts.com website and couldn't find them listed.

Thanks!

 

Just go to the local ford dealer and buy new ones. I also bought the ebay bearing after paying $350+ for a local one. The studs on mine were the coarse thread. You will need to know what thread you have. If the stud you pulled out will not fit due to fine threads just buy the replacement coarse studs AND NUTS.

The next problem you will have will be the big seal. Take the drive shaft with you to the ford dealer, buy the big seal and pay the service mgr to put it on. They charged me $10.00 to put it on. But it is really helpful if you clean the axle before you give it to them. You might also remove the old seal. Not really a big job just takes a BFH to get it off with a good punch and vise.

 

I'm realizing that my post was not very clear.

The wheel studs were included on the new hub. Even better, they're the proper thread (coarse). I checked this before buying the new hub.

The replacement bearing/hub has studs that connect it to the axle with nuts on the other side. Those studs are what I'm looking for (even more obscure).

Any help would be appreciated.

 

Get a hold of Ed-FTE parts guy,he will help you out.

 

Great, thank you. Is that his user name, or where do I find him?

 

He's a sponsor on this site.
Look up on the sponsor list and you will see him.

 

This site has all the info you need:

Welcome to guzzle's 4x4 Needle Bearing Maintenance Web Page


It is a grrreat how to... plus it has all the part #'s you need.

BTW... here's the correct part # for the studs (according to Guzzle)... F81Z-1107-AA

Good luck!!

 

Bob, thanks for the link!

The local Ford dealer has 4 in stock. I'm picking them up today, hopefully will have the truck back together this evening.

 

Truck's back together, drives great!

Interesting lesson from this: One thing I'd noticed was that the braking didn't seem great on the truck, certainly not as good as it had been. The pedal was somewhat mushy, and it seemed like a lot of travel for the same braking effort. Well, I'm pretty sure this was the problem. I took the thing out for a quick test drive last night after getting it back together and also drove it to work this morning, and the brake pedal was back to being tight as I had known it to be. I didn't change anything on the brake system, but the bearing having exploded was allowing the wheel to flop around.

Interestingly, I otherwise had no symptoms until the bearing started squealing around hard left turns.

My truck has 116k on it. It might not be a bad idea to check the wheel bearings on our trucks! I'll be making a point of checking it a bit more frequently now. When I had the truck inspected in November (which was about 10,000 miles ago) the bearings were tight, and I hadn't checked it since as I hadn't gotten indications that I needed to.

Thanks for the great help, as I've always received from this forum. When I got to the Ford dealer to pick up the studs, the parts guy asked me how I got the number, because they didn't even have the thing listed in the system otherwise, nor did they know they stocked it. Once I got home, getting the whole thing back together was simple. The hard part in my case was taking it all apart, but Ford did actually design the thing will in terms of being simple to assemble. Disassembly would have been fine were it not for the fact that a number of the parts were stuck together in one way or another. Assembly was simple.

Thanks again!

 

When the bearing is failing with lots of play the rotor can't run true in the caliper. This is possibly what gave the "mushy" feeling in the brakes. Glad you got it straightened out. I have already finished my right side and found pretty much the same issues. I have the bearing ready to do the left side time permitting.

 

Yep, that's what I figured on why the brakes got mushy.

I'm figuring the left side will probably go before long. In another month or two I'll need to pull the exhaust manifold off on that side and redo the gasket anyway, so when that happens I'll check the bearings again on that side.

 

Resurrecting an old thread here. So all I need to do is replace the wheel bearing if I have slop when I wiggle my wheel? No need to replace the entire hub assembly?

 

Not sure it's that simple djkswiss. Can you give more information on your truck and symptoms? What you've replaced thus far, some history?

 

The fine vs course thread stud was the stud to mount the bearing hub assembly on a 4wd to the truck, not the wheel studs. The hub assemblies have 2 different thread assembly, both will work but you must have the correct nuts for the 4 studs.

 

Ok well I bought new tires and toldthem to do a front end alignment. They wouldn't do the alignment as they said I needed a new left front hub assembly. I jacked the truck up annd grabbed the top annd bottom of the wheel and it rocks back and forth and has quite abit of slop. It is also dificult to spin the wheel. And it makes a grinding noise.