Could the splash shield be touching the rotor somewhere?

#3 on diagram, in post 2 here:
http://www.alfabb.com/bb/forums/spider-1966-up/145806-front-brake-rotor-removal-pictures.html

 

Could the splash shield be touching the rotor somewhere?

I like this idea. Bad wheel bearings wouldn't make a rubbing noise. Can you pass a piece of paper between the inside of the disk and the shield without any binding?

A small amount of drag by the pads is normal and will cause a slight noise.

Yes, but if the pads still dragged after gamebowser "pulled off the wheels, and calipers and brakes" then he would have a bigger problem!

 

Disassemble, check wheel bearings and races, replace if needed, repack if OK, and reassemble per manual. Pay attention to torque procedure when reassembling. Both should turn freely and smoothly (and not touch the splash gaurd). Anything else is a problem.

 

+1 to this. wheel bearings.

 

A small amount of drag by the pads is normal and will cause a slight noise.

 

Whoops! Thanks for pointing that out Jay. I had better start skimming the posts a little better... Sorry folks.

 

Rotors Do Not Spin Equally

Simple to figure out.
Could be:
1. Nut too Tight
2. Bad Bearing, Bad seals-leaking lube.

Remove the cotter pin, check the tightness of the nut, if not too tight take off, remove the rotor, check the inner and outer bearings. If bad replace. To regrease the bearings, place a good amount of wheel bearing grease in the palm of one hand, hold the bearing in the other hand. Push the bearing through the grease in your palm, making grease go inside and do this for the full 360 degrees. Reinstall with low torque on the nut.

 

From the Alfa Shop Manual:

 

I have attached a link to me spinning the rotors showing the difference between the two sides:

I loosened the slow spinning rotor outer nut a tiny bit and it started to spin a tiny bit better, but still not nearly as well as the other side.

I also am including pictures of what I did afterwords.
I pulled off the outer bearing to take a look at it. Then the rotor and hub came off together with the inner bearing inside. The grease appears quite dark. I do not remember it appearing this way when I repacked the outer bearing in my auto class 8 years ago.
Does the color of the grease not matter. Does it necessarily need repacking?

Should I remove the inner bearing and repack it in addition to repacking the outer bearing?

Why would anyone repack a bearing in the first place if it already has lube in it?

All these pics are of the passenger side which I started working on.
This is the link to my dropbox picture folder. Click to see the pics I took of the wheel.
https://www.dropbox.com/sc/ntnr36oy3t8kc8s/53bYzqnG2q

Thanks,
Rich

 

Why would anyone repack a bearing in the first place if it already has lube in it?

For the same reason you change the oil in the engine, transmission & differential. The lube gets contaminated & 'wears out'. Regular lubricant changes helps the component last a lot longer.

Remove the bearings, clean out the old grease (paper towels to get the majority out then solvent to wash away the rest). Do not spin a dry bearing! Inspect the bearing rollers & races for damage - the bearing surfaces must be smooth without discoloration, pits, scores, etc. If everything looks good repack the bearings, replace the inner seal and install as shown in the shop manual.

 

I'd say the right side has a more "normal" behavior. The left side spins like it's dry with out much seal drag and a loose nut. But I've never done this to mine, so I'm sure others will have a more experienced based opinion...

 

I sort of agree with you on this Seventy1 !........both mine turn fine, but they don't spin/freewheel like that left hand one in gamebrowser's video, posted above!

 

Is it worth repacking the inner bearings? I haven't done it before and I understand it will require replacing the seals which I do not have.
Also, can I get the rotor off the hub without messing with the bearings?

 

yes the bearings will all come out without any issue. the seals are a different matter. if you are particularly carefull you can save them but its always smart to replace them. there is no magic to them. they are a std metric seal and can be bought ( most of the time and depending on where you are ) at a local industrial bearing supply house. as can the bearings as well. they will just look at the bearing and seal numbers and look them up. they are ( or were ) generic metric bearings and seals.

 

IAP is out of stock on the wheel seals... do you know where you can buy them?

 

Try local auto parts stores. These are wear items and not crazy rare or unobtainable parts.

Look for wheel bearings and seals made by a manufacturer called FAG (aka Schaeffler). I believe they made the wheel bearings originally for most Spiders.

 

seals are $6.75 items from Centerline and you could possibly find them locally at an auto parts store if you looked - they are not something that has to be uniquely OEM. When I changed my rotors, I could not get the seals out without beating them up pretty badly; you want to have new stuff on hand. (Centerline shows them as backordered, along with lots and lots of other stuff these days - maybe they're still reeling from the floods this summer?)

Now would also be a good time to pick up some nitrile gloves too! Cleaning out the hub is a messy job.

 

I'd bet you will find the bearings bad unless my hearing misinterpreted the sound of it spinning in your video. But the good things is fresh bearings and seals are an easy job which gives peace of mind.

 

Any recommendations on the best way to clean old grease out of a bearing?
Brakeleen I know is good for finishing up, but how do you get the grease out of the center etc and between the race and the bearing?

also,

Any recs on repacking it without a bearing packer? I saw something online showing placing the bearing in a plastic bag with grease and then mushing it around until a good amount went inside the bearing.

 

A common way to pack a bearing by hand is shown by many Youtube videos. A little messy but effective. Cleaning a bearing can be done with a pan of solvent and a stiff brush.

 

So this is really sad.
I finally got up the guts to try to just repack the internal and external bearings both. And I tried and leave the nut on the spindle and pull out the rotor to dislodge the seal and inner bearing. They aren't even close to coming out that seal is pressed in tight. So I tried putting in a large socket and banging, no except partially damaging the seal. Now I can't go back.

So I'm left with 2 possible options.
1. jack up my other car and lower it down on the socket to try to use the cars weight to press the seal out along wtih the internal bearing.
2. Go to a machine shop and ask them to press the seal out.

Any additional advice appreciated. Thank you.
btw, this is such a messy job. Grease everywhere.

 

Take it to a local machine shop. Mine charged me $10 to press out the existing transmission mount and press in a new one. Taking care of your bearing isn't going to cost much, especially if you drop it off with a "when you can get to it..." attitude. Leveraging the weight of a motor vehicle against car parts can't end well

 

Stuck internal bearing and seal?

88 Graduate front wheels

So this is really sad.
I finally got up the guts to try to just repack the internal and external bearings both. And I tried and leave the nut on the spindle and pull out the rotor to dislodge the seal and inner bearing. They aren't even close to coming out that seal is pressed in tight. So I tried putting in a large socket and banging, no except partially damaging the seal. Now I can't go back.

So I'm left with 2 possible options.
1. jack up my other car and lower it down on the socket to try to use the cars weight to press the seal out along wtih the internal bearing.
2. Go to a machine shop and ask them to press the seal out.

Any additional advice appreciated. Thank you.
btw, this is such a messy job. Grease everywhere.

 

If you simply put a large socket through the hub you are likely to be pressing against a 'shelf' where the bearing seats. Once you get most of the grease out of the middle part of the hub, look closely for small notched out areas of that seat. Use a hammer & drift (I like a long brass rod) and tap the bearing & the seal out.

 

Or use a seal removal tool, like the one pictured below (which will damage the seal). As ghnl wrote, you are probably pushing against something else - the seal itself comes out pretty easily.

 

Old trick. Put axle nut back on & bang the hub with bearing to the nut. this will bring the seal out.

 

The volvo trick actually worked! ill post a video in due time.

 

Now I just need to find a place to order the seal.
O'Reilly said they can get me the seal for 12 dollars each. Made by Masterpro. Does the manufacturer of the seal really matter? Ill keep looking online for other options.

 

assuming it is the seal we're discussing, a long punch will drive it out easily. Do some research on putting the new ones back in as you don't really want it "****ed" and...I smear a wee bit of wheel brg grease on the seal rubber/wiper/seal (pick your name) to keep it lubed. been my experience, who makes it doesn't matter so much as getting it in right. ciao, chris

 

Interestingly my wheel hub is stuck to the rotor. I removed those two bolts. Lots of banging and PB blaster was a no go. Even some heating with a torch didn't work... Any other suggestions?

 

So you removed the cap at the end of the hub, right? You then need to remove the hub entirely to get the front rotors off. You do that by undoing a large nut under that cap.




Also if the rotor doesn't look like it overheated - how do you know that it did?

 

I think I am going to be left with either one of 2 options.
My passenger rotor is the one that overheated due to a sticking brake, so I believe I should be replacing that rotor, even though it might look ok, because it overheated and may be damaged from that. This rotor detached from the hub fine and I can replace it, unless you think it doesn't need it...

1. The rotor that didn't overheat (driver side) is stuck to the hub. I could replace the passenger side only and sand the stuck rotor with sand paper and stick it back on, or

2. Bang the heck out of it, and hope it comes off, otherwise I'll have a damaged stuck on rotor. And worse comes to worse potentially pressing it off by lowering a cars weight onto the rotor to pop the hub off the rotor... Not to enthused about this though.

 

To provide the updated situation and resolution. I repacked the internal and external bearings with grease and the rotors now spin equally.
Additionally I was able to get the hubs off the rotors finally. The driver side was really stuck, but lots of PB blaster and then finally taking a large screwdriver and placing it into the grooves and banging it good, then moving it to other spots and doing the same thing.
New rotors! hurray!

 

Here is how I removed the stuck seals