I've never been able to increase or decrease bearing rumbling by swearing.

On Sun, Jan 19, 2014 at 4:43 PM, Stuart MacMillan <stuartmacm@gmail.com>wrote:

> Do a search for "catastrophic bearing failure photos" and you'll be
> motivated to fix it!
>
> Stuart
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf Of
> Jim Felder
> Sent: Sunday, January 19, 2014 8:10 AM
> To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
> Subject: Tell me about rear bearings
>
> Of all the Vanagon things I have done, here is one I have not. On the road,
> at any speed, if I turn the car to the left so as to put the force on the
> right side, I hear a rum-rum-rum sound that matches the rotational speed of
> the car. Suspecting races that were not fully seated on the front wheels
> (like all low frequency sounds, it's hard to get a location on this by
> listening) after a recent replacement, I jacked up the front and checked
> the bearings. They don't move and any noise I hear I believe is the slight
> drag of the pads and on the rotors.
>
> I jacked up the rear and this is what I found: there is not any noticeable
> wobble on eaither of the rear wheels, but I can pull them in and out with a
> noticeable clunk and about 1/16 of free play, maybe a hair more.
>
> Does that signal replacement time, or is there more I could be doing to
> check the bearings? The car doesn't make any other unusual sounds form the
> drive train when going straight down the road.
>
> Jim
>