rear wheel bearing life???

[Lawrence R.]

What is the average rear wheel bearing life? I have a 73 with 74,000 mile and planning a trip to Florida, I don't hear any noise. Can these be greased? Thanks

[Jim T.]

Re: rear wheel bearing life???

Yes they can, remove the trailing arms and send them to www.bairs.com to get them serviced for many miles of driving pleasure.

[Michael W.]

Re: rear wheel bearing life???

Depending on the source, anywhere from 25K to 40K miles seems to be the recommended service interval. They cannot be greased in manner similar to a ball joint, complete disass'y is required to do a proper job. I'd plan on a complete overhaul of the TA if the history of them is unknown.

[Gary R.]

Re: rear wheel bearing life???

Forget about trying to grease rear bearings. You can waste your time and money on those cheap grease tools only to kid yourself the job is correct. These bearings are pressed on,so to remove them will wreck them. If they need grease then rebuild the arm and use USA bearings and a quality grease.
Rebuilding them is a different story many do them,some good some not so good. Without a surface grinder to dial them in I wouldn't consider doing them and I've done a lot of them.

[Harry H.]

Re: rear wheel bearing life???

Gary, I am looking to get mine done. I heard you do a good job. Don't know if I need to rebuild but my car has not move since 1972 and has 57,000mi. Chassis is all apart now. What do you think?

Harry

[Greg A.]

Re: rear wheel bearing life???

Lawrence, I don't think you got a reply to your question regarding the average life...I think many will say "it depends." I just had mine replaced at 101,000 miles (no noise either, but excessive play). My Corvette mechanic told me he usually sees them needing replacement around 80,000 miles, but the correct method should be to raise the rear and check for play in each rear wheel...too much play would indicate worn bearings.

I'd suggest to have someone with some C3 knowledge to check over the car before your trip. You may well be fine, but on the other hand, they will likely need replacing in the near future anyway...hope this is helpful.

Greg.

[Patrick H.]

Re: rear wheel bearing life???

I'll go with the "it depends" answer. I'm sure Gary could shed more light on it than most.

My 71 had 106000 on it when I replaced them, only because it had never been done. My 72 has 61000 miles and has nominal end play when measured with a dial indicator. The 72 I'm working on has 69000 miles and the rear bearings howl like a hound dog, and have well over 40 thousandths end play with a dial indicator. I think it's probably more, but that was checked without even disconnecting the half shafts, and I knew it was fruitless to go further. When you can see the brake disc visibly wobbling in and out when you pull on it, that's a good hint.

[Michael F.]

Re: rear wheel bearing life???

Ya, mine are ready to go to bairs. Theres play and a light growling noise.

[Gary R.]

Re: rear wheel bearing life???

Gary, I am looking to get mine done. I heard you do a good job. Don't know if I need to rebuild but my car has not move since 1972 and has 57,000mi. Chassis is all apart now. What do you think?

Harry

Hi Harry
Well if the car has sat 38 years and the chassis is apart I would certainly do the bearings & arms. I remember my buddy rebuilt his T-10 4 spd in his 62, then let the car sit 10 years. All the new bearings were shot. Granted those are not packed in grease but I would still install some good ole USA Timkens in your arms.

[Lawrence R.]

Re: rear wheel bearing life???

Thanks for all the info and have talked with Bair's, Great bunch of people on here.

[Harry H.]

Re: rear wheel bearing life???

Hi Harry
Well if the car has sat 38 years and the chassis is apart I would certainly do the bearings & arms. I remember my buddy rebuilt his T-10 4 spd in his 62, then let the car sit 10 years. All the new bearings were shot. Granted those are not packed in grease but I would still install some good ole USA Timkens in your arms.

Thanks Gary, thats what I thought. I will be having them done.

Harry

[Michael W.]

Re: rear wheel bearing life???

Lawrence, I don't think you got a reply to your question regarding the average life...I think many will say "it depends."

The problem with stating an 'average' life is that 50% of the events will occur above that number, and it requires running the piece to failure to find out. Added to the problem is that many bearing failures give little or no advance notice and the cascading results can be dangerous at worst, but never inexpensive or not inconvenient.

Under these circumstances, it's not the average life that is desired, it's the 'lowest life' that is used to help determine an appropriate maintenance task.

In the case of C2/C3 rear wheel bearings, at least those with the second design tight fit, failures below approx 50K appear to be rare. Beyond that, the rate appears to rise to the point that beyond X mileage, there's very few surviving cases of 'good' bearings. Perhaps 100K would be a good threshold.

All this to say that if the service history is unknown or the car has more than 40K miles on the bearings, it's prudent to have them serviced soon. At my present usage, my own car will be due in about November 2031. Can somebody remind me please?

[Roger O.]

Re: rear wheel bearing life???

Another factor to consider is ,were the rear bearings lubed using the injector at the recommended times ?

[John H.]

Re: rear wheel bearing life???

Another factor to consider is ,were the rear bearings lubed using the injector at the recommended times ?

Roger -

The "injector" is useless, and was never recommended by GM. Oddly enough, GM never specified any sort of maintenance or lubrication schedule for the rear spindle bearings.

[Roger O.]

Re: rear wheel bearing life???

Roger -

The "injector" is useless, and was never recommended by GM. Oddly enough, GM never specified any sort of maintenance or lubrication schedule for the rear spindle bearings.

Are you sure , because I've been using a J-24488 injector on customer cars for many many years ?