I wouldn’t hammer anything .. yes they are old bearings but you can damage the carrier .. all you need is a bit of studding some nuts ,a socket and wind them out .. There will always be play due to the style of bearings ,they just need to be tight in the housing and fairly nice on the shaft … Cheap bearings are a false economy and are usually the wrong spec … Avoid GSF bearings
gsf don’t manufacture bearings, ask them for the quality you would like and they will supply it, go there yo buy the cheapest thing on the market and they will supply that too.
Seems I'm stuck for today as I don't have a decent circlip removal tool. The GSF premium bearings are skf so I'm guessing they should be ok. Looking on the Schofields webpage they recommend febi.
Yup. SKF or FAG are the choice. The generic kits can be a bit pot luck and as it's a bit of a ball ache job it's prob worth fitting the best you can afford. These below do the job as well and for those of you with T3s and bays it's worth getting a set in. We are seeing some of the quality bearings go on short supply. Syncro fronts were always European manufactured, but the latest batch are FAG branded Chinese. Hopefully nothing to worry about, but that's even more of a tit of a job and not one you want to do every year really. https://www.brickwerks.co.uk/wheel-bearing-kit-t3-rear.html
You may be able to wind the bearings out with studding, but sometimes you dont have the right bits of metal. One thing I noticed was that one of the brands of roller races was "sided" with a more rounded edge one side - that side is easier to start into the hub carrier going back in. Both brands of bearings (Meyle or Vtech) , the roller bearing rattled around before the outer race was compressed as it was driven into the hub carrier , so trying them out before fitting them may make you think they are already loose.
I can't add much to this thread other than to say I remember changing both rear hub bearings on mine a long time ago and haven't had cause to touch them since. Just checked my records and indeed, it was a looooong time ago, 1998! Almost 40,000 miles later and they're still good. I can say for sure that I was really hard up back then and would've carried out the job without any specialist tools and the bearing kits would've been sourced locally (Lion Garage, Leicester and probably SKF or FAG) at a time when good quality parts at reasonable prices were still taken for granted.
Problem now is the outer race is stuck. I don't see how you can get too it from the inside as if the race is flush with the shoulder.
The outer roller race should be sitting on top of the shoulder nearest the wheel, it is the wide U shaped channel that carried the rollers. In your last picture it looks like that has gone .. if you have a bearing kit in front of you its fairly obvious.
Unfortunately I don't have the new bearing with me yet. This is what I have out so far and I'm thinking this part should come out too?
That looks like you have got the whole roller bearing out. Which means that the worst is over. That bit inside you are pointing at is the machined step in the carrier.
Finally got this finished off tonight. I'm happy to report that there is now no play in the bearing which is a relief. Just checked the other side and that's pretty bad so that's next on the list. Hopefully I'll be a bit quicker now I know what I'm doing. I managed to get the bolt tightened upto around 300nm and give it a bit more with the 3/4 extension round to the next hole for the split pin. I'll get this checked when it goes in for the mot.
Get the bathroom scales out, hang on to the end of your 3ft bar and tighten it until you get 6 stone lighter (or heavier). That’s about 253 ft lbs.
Alternatively, when the castle nut comes loose tap it round with a toffee hammer and a punch (coz that's all you've got), and drive carefully to the local garage! Methoni, Peloponnese, grafting on a wiggly wheel whilst the current Mrs Monkey cares not.. Reward for having a hammer and punch on board
I've never changed mine and the van has registered around 180k.. since '73. Still no play or whines and as it's Westy its had it's fair share of lugging stuff around all its life. Not sure I fancy trying to replace them even if BQ parts were available. Please spare me but the bearings aren't sided are they.
