Spacers came in today so I can fit my front wheels properly and get rid of the tiny rub I have between the coil and tire.
Also, my shipment of Neo Synthetic wheel bearing grease came in, so I repacked the front 5 lug hubs. This stuff is awesome!
-Gotta start by removing the top (outboard) inner race.
-Came out like buttah!
-Look at that old waxy grease. This hub has never seen use, so the grease looks thick. I took apart my used hubs to repack them, and they were definitely going to need a regreasing eventually. The grease had thinned out substantially.
-The next thing to come out is the lower (inboard) inner race. This one is pretty easy since you get full access to it's top. Just gotta prop the hub on something to support the outside of the bearing since the race has a wide dust shield pressed on.
-The balls are held in by a plastic cage. There are two styles that I've encountered so far. This one has a simpler cage in it, which I like a lot. The older hubs I have use a cage that has more fragile bits on it that could potentially snap off. Just gotta be careful when you're popping the balls out. The good thing with the newer style hubs is that once one ball is out, the cage falls down and the rest fall out. The other interesting thing about the update is that there is one more ball bearing per set of bearings. The old ones have 11 (22 per hub) and the newer ones have 12 (24 per hub).
-Wash rinse repeat until all the balls on the race are out. The cage comes out pretty easily. On the newer hubs it just came right out with no muss or fuss. The older cage is a slight bit larger, and requires a minimal amount of force to come out. Just turn it 90 degrees and pull gently.
-My what dirty balls I have!
Repeat for the lower set of ball bearings. These guys are a bit livelier. They kept wanting to jump out and skitter across my work surface. Once the balls are out, the cage can be turned 90 and removed through the outboard side. This one is much larger than the outboard cage, and requires a bit more "negotiation" to get out. Still need to be careful so as not to break any of the fingers on the cage.
-All the ball bearings are removed and I turned the cage slightly to pull it out of the outboard side.
-Turned a full 90 degrees and pulled out through the top.
-All that grease, getting ready to be cleaned off.
I wiped everything down next to get the thick parts of the grease off. Makes it a little easier for my detergent to cut the remaining film.
-Saved so they can't run away from me.
-Wiped as much grease out as possible.
-Next I filled up my sink with some dish detergent and water to remove the remaining grease. Cleaning the cages is a chore, and I found a toothbrush works fine until it gets loaded up with grease. Being careful with a paper towel seemed to be the most effective way of dealing with it. Wash everything off and rinse it all thoroughly. Then dry everything to prevent any excess moisture from being trapped next to the metal parts before you apply grease.
-A proctologist in training? Big globs of grease are best. There is literally no such thing as too much grease when you start this process.
-Filled in the bearing channels of the outer race.
-Thoroughly coated the inboard cage and put it back in. It's beast to try and get it as far through as possible till part of it is poking out the inboard hole before trying to rotate it back into position. I found that trying to rotate it too shallow led to it locking into the outboard bearing channel.
-Put a huge glop of grease in the palm of your hand and roll the bearing around in it till it's thoroughly coated.
-A thick coat!
-Snap it back in place. The first few are pretty easily put in as the cage moves a bit. The last few will give you a satisfying pop when they fall in place. Double check that all the parts are seated and wipe a bit more grease on the exposed balls. The top was a bit more problematic. On the older hubs, the cage snapped into place with the first few ball bearings and made the rest easy to get in place. The newer hub's cage refused to stay in place, and it wasn't until the last ball bearing went in did it stay in place.
-All ball bearings accounted for and back in place! Next I coated the inside of the inner races and tapped them back in place.
I rebuilt my 5 lugs AND my S14 4 lugs that are going to tide me over for the time being on my GKTech knuckles.