repacking the front wheel bearings

[Italchic]

In another post I talked about adjusting the front wheel bearings. A friend told me I should have repacked them first but the shop manual mentioned only adjusting them and then packing the cap. So who's right?

[dmwhiteoak]

I believe you should allways pack the bearings with grease prior to instalation. I know people who also cram as much grease into the hub and cap that is possible. I do not and have had no trouble, although repacking and checking wheel bearings are part of the maintenance that I try to do on a yearly basis on all my vehicles.

[4uall]

here is a good video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LC9MxUCvI8

[Fiat88]

I wish there was more vids like this one on our car!

[fiat218]

I believe you should allways pack the bearings with grease prior to instalation. I know people who also cram as much grease into the hub and cap that is possible. I do not and have had no trouble, although repacking and checking wheel bearings are part of the maintenance that I try to do on a yearly basis on all my vehicles.

Cram it in

[giuliot60]

That is a very good video Jay.

Pack the grease in! Also do the bearings if you can.

[sleggar3]

how much should you torque the bearing nut to?

[hayesbd]

The proper way to set the wheel bearing endplay is as follows:

1. Tighten the nut to around 15 ft-lbs while spinning the hub 4 or 5 turns in each direction to seat the bearing rollers.
2. Back off the nut and re-tighten to 5 ft-lbs.
3. Back off 30 degrees and stake the nut into the the spindle groove.

These steps are a paraphrase of the shop manual and are obviously designed to set a small amount of endplay on the bearings. Fiat does not recommend setting the bearings up with any preload, even though many mechanics routinely do this. The reason for this is that it is impossible to reliably generate a predictable, consistent preload and it is breathtakingly easy to put it together with too much preload which will destroy the bearings very quickly. I cannot tell you how many times I have seen improperly adjusted wheel bearings with both passenger cars (my hobby) and heavy trucks (my profession as engineer).

Hope this helps.

Brian

[sleggar3]

ok this make sense i dont have a repair man. this is the way i do it but was not sure if fiat has a pre load or not
thanks alot