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I just had the brakes done on my ‘70 and one thing the shop noticed (bear in mind this is just a local shop by me i saw they a had a c2 in for work and I thought disc brakes was something they could handle) there’s some play in my rear wheel. So first they told me the wheel bearing should be replaced and now they are telling me since it requires special tools to get to the bearing, which they don’t have, and even if they did have it the tech is assuming the bearing has melted. So they are saying the rear hub and bearing assembly should all be replaced and that’s not cheap. Should I seek a second opinion? Also, is it common for bearings to “melt” in these cars? From other reading I have done I have read that the suspension in these cars can make it seem like the bearing has failed when it could actually be another issue. Please let me know your thoughts and opinions. This is getting in the way of me enjoying the car sadly though safety is my top priority.
Should I seek a second opinion? Also, is it common for bearings to “melt” in these cars?
YES to a 2nd opinion, but only if you feel there is a problem from the way the car drives and sounds in the rear. My opinion is you need to find a new shop that's not trying to upsell you. The bearings don't melt; impossible. You'd know of a problem from the sound and, at the extreme, seizing long before any melting occurred. Failed bearings are not subtle.Comment #21 by 68hemi explains why this is not a truism.
Where is the play? 12:00/6:00? 3:00/9:00? In/Out from the differential? How secure are the struts in their mountings?
Second, educate yourself a bit on the topic by reading a few of the many posts in the forum. You’ll be glad you did so you can avoid the snake oil sales pitch.
The bearings won’t melt but they will eventually wear to the point that they need to be replaced. It does take some specialized tools to do the job properly.
A properly installed bearing will have 0.001-0.0015” of play. The factory tolerances are 0.003-0.008” which is way too loose. If you have access to a dial indicator, you can measure them yourself before deciding your next steps.
Curious to know what they did regarding the brakes. Did they replace the rotors? If they did, what kind of runout did they measure after replacement?
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Curious to know what they did regarding the brakes. Did they replace the rotors? If they did, what kind of runout did they measure after replacement?
The issue was at speeds I’d say 35+ when I applied the brakes the car wanted to go hard to right. So the front brake pads, rotors, and calipers were replaced. Unsure of the measurements I would have to ask
Below are the parts:
CE Brake Hydraulic Hose - BRAKE HOSE
AC Disc Brake Rotor - ROTOR ASM FRT B
AC Disc Brake Caliper - CALIPER ASM FRT
AC Disc Brake Caliper - CALIPER ASM FRT
AC Disc Brake Pad Set - PAD SET FRT DIS
TM Wheel Seal - SEAL
TM Wheel Bearing and Race Set - TAPERED BRG ***
TM Wheel Bearing and Race Set - TAPERED BRG ***
DB Brake Hydraulic Hose Lock Clip - BRAKE HYDRAULIC
YES to a 2nd opinion, but only if you feel there is a problem from the way the car drives and sounds in the rear. My opinion is you need to find a new shop that's not trying to upsell you. The bearings don't melt; impossible. You'd know of a problem from the sound and, at the extreme, seizing long before any melting occurred. Failed bearings are not subtle.
Where is the play? 12:00/6:00? 3:00/9:00? In/Out from the differential? How secure are the struts in their mountings?
Honestly I thought the car was driving fine. I didn’t notice anything loud or annoying coming from the rear. The initial problem was the car pulling hard to right when braking.
Luckily I do know other shops that specialize more in classics but as I said I just thought disc brakes would be a common thing to address.
And again I would have to ask the shop to answer those questions.
Sounds like that shop is not skilled in the TA. If you use them, they will either wreck parts and not assemble it correctly or just send them out for an exchange and charge you double.
Get the car home and if you are able to jack it up and pull the wheels you can check the condition yourself with some guidance.
Sounds like that shop is not skilled in the TA. If you use them, they will either wreck parts and not assemble it correctly or just send them out for an exchange and charge you double.
Get the car home and if you are able to jack it up and pull the wheels you can check the condition yourself with some guidance.
That’s the plan to take it home tomorrow and a good suggestion. Appreciate the feedback
I would remove the wheel and check it. How much 'play' was there? The bearings can and do seize up (melt is good enough) ...and the axle snaps (tire falls off and busts up the rear fender). But obviously if yours was melted you wouldn't have driven it there (or home). But if there's excessive free-play, you'd sure want to know it and start thinking about next steps. But maybe it's not that much.
Honestly I thought the car was driving fine. I didn’t notice anything loud or annoying coming from the rear. The initial problem was the car pulling hard to right when braking.
Luckily I do know other shops that specialize more in classics but as I said I just thought disc brakes would be a common thing to address.
And again I would have to ask the shop to answer those questions.
If it were my car, I'd be inclined to continue driving it and be aware of any development of rear end noise, especially on hard left/right turns. As I mentioned before, failing bearings would make themselves known well before any catastrophic seizing or parts leaving the car. You wouldn't be able to ignore the deteriorating situation.
The shop is correct that bearing replacement requires some specialized tooling to replace them on the car. If the entire trailing arm is removed from the chassis the job is much more doable with regular presses. I did mine with borrowed tools from my local Chevy dealer 40 years ago on my '67 in my driveway but wouldn't do it today. They'd be sent to a rebuilder who has the experience and expertise to set them up right.
GTR is our rear suspension guru. by TA he meant trailing arm. google and youtube trailing arm bearing replacement and inspection. it will probably make you more knowledgable about your rear suspension than those guys are. then, once you know what perfect is and what acceptable is if you can't measure the play yourself you are in a position to have somebody show you just how much play is there. may well be right in the acceptable range. there have been people who clean and paint perfectly good parts and charge the customer for replacing the perfectly good "bad part"..
It's just much quicker and easier for them to replace eveything.
FWIW I was charged $1,150 by a shop for two rebuilt 63-82 Corvette Trailing Arm Assemblies (Includes Blasted, Primed & Painted Trailing Arms, All Bushings, Bearings, Seals and Complete Stainless Steel Park Brake Kit). Add labour to that.
also google trailing arm prices. they are right around where C6 said in the previous post. so if you have a bit of bearing play but it drives ok, you need to decide if spending 1500 to 2k to have these arms rebuilt or replaced for no noticeable ride improvement on a 500 mile per year car... it also may not be wheel bearings. it could be the half shafts flopping in and out because of a worn rear diff. or u-joints.
Could be they are just trying to up sell you (likely) or the play may be coming from the trailing arm bushing not from the bearing itself.
If it turns out to be the bearing, you would at least in the case of this shop, and many others, be better off buying a new assembled swing arm. Eliminates them messing it up. Still has to be removed and put back on, but maybe you might feel comfortable doing that yourself.
What no one is really mentioning is that the rear wheel bearing replacement in the trailing arms is one of the toughest jobs to get "right" on these old cars. 99% of shops can'tdo it. They just do not have the tools or the expertise. It requires special tools and specific expertise specific to these 50 year old cars. It is a job like no other car. If they are bad, you are far better off sending the entire trailing arms off to one of the 5 or 6 Corvette experts in the whole country. They can do this correctly. Then most any garage could bolt them back on.
Unfortunately for you replacing brake rotors is another sneaky & tricky job. You cannot just bolt on a new brake rotor on these cars like 99% of other cars. They must be shimmed for "wobble" or "run-out" and it must be near .001" , way tighter than any other car, or the wobble will tear up the caliper seals and you will have leaky brakes down the road. Another job for a vette shop or a GOOD garage. I would have yours double-checked for run-out with a dial indicator, or ask them if they set the run-out to .001" Chances are they did not.
All these things can be done correctly with a little knowledge of C3s.
I bought a pre-assembled replacement from Zip, 403 bucks after the core charge, easy swap and no BS shimming and set-up crap. I've set up bearing assemblies and differentials and all that stuff, It's fun the first time you do it, after that, nothing beats having someone else do it. Just my opinion.
I had mine done by Van Steel as they offered a "Million Mile Warranty" on the trailing arms and rear wheel bearing assemblies. The problem is that you need to remove the trailing arms and ship them to them. It is not the easiest thing to remove but can be done if you take your time and have a sawzall. I would have been happy to Pay $1200 to have someone remove them and rebuild them "properly". It is a dirty job on jack stands and not much fun if the bolts are frozen, hence the sawzall.
I learned my trailing arms were bad when my car started "crabbing" down the PA Turnpike at over 35 mph during a horrific Rain storm from the remnants of Hurricane Andrew (in August 1991). You do not want to find out that way, "Trust me" on that one. If they are moving very much at all I would get it done sooner than later as it is a safety issue. If you buy the complete trailing arm assemblies they offer them with the new rear discs and new parking brakes all set up and ready to go. If you ever want to install larger rear wheels this is the time to do it as they offer off-set trailing arms that allow bigger tire/wheel combinations.
Getting the Parking brake to work properly is really important. I did it myself the first time and I replaced all the parts with the SS variety. They have worked ever since and that is important to me. Once I had a master cylinder fail while driving and thank goodness I had a four speed and a working parking brake. I was able to get home where I could replace the master cylinder without any issues. Finding the master cylinder locked up (felt like there was a brick under the brake pedal) was exciting entering a 25 mph clover leaf at 70+.
One other good thing to do to an older Corvette is to replace the rubber lines that go from the brake system hard lines to the calipers at each wheel. Those get old and can expand or close off causing brake issues. They are fairly easy to change out. I would strongly suggest you replace them with the SS Braided Hoses which do not expand (as much) and make the pedal feel a bit firmer than the rubber replacement hoses. It appears that they replaced one or both of the front hoses according to your parts list. Be sure the ones you get are D.O.T. approved when you buy them as there are plenty of cheap chinese junk parts out there.
Get a copy of the Assembly Instruction Manual for your year Corvette and a good GM shop manual and everything will be easier for you. Most of the aftermarket manuals made by Clymers or Haynes are not work it. The GM manuals have better trouble shooting and electrical support. The aftermarket suppliers make copies of the vehicles wiring on big laminated sheets to hang in the garage. Dr. Rebuild made a really nice Vacuum hose layout which is also laminated. I bought one when I bought the set of hoses for my 1968 Corvette and I refer to it every so often.
It's really not the 'play' in the bearings that causes failure as it is dry bearings. Could be another shop did the work and just stopped the shimming process when it was 'good enough'. That's just conjecture ...obviously I don't know. It depends on how much play there really is. I'd be more inclined to raise the vehicle, remove the driveshaft, spin the wheel ...while holding a stick to my ear (the other end on the hub) or a stethescope, and listen to determine if the bearings sound 'dry'. Compare to the other hub. A skilled guy should be able to tell when bearings are dry. You can hear them 'fall' within their cage. Bearings can get dry from a dragging caliper heating up the hub/bearings (not unheard of in a vette).
So before you condemn it, try to get more into. Obviously the only way to guarantee 100% is to re-do it. But there are steps you can take to try to help determine what you DO have. Many owners who've had a snapped axle report that the time between initial signs of a problem and a snapped axle (on the highway) can be as low as a matter of seconds ...not minutes, days or weeks. It's highly variable. Just google it and read owner's posts.
05-03-2022, 08:31 PM
Rear Wheel Bearing Advice
