Build Thread 1978 Fairmont. I bet somebody back home’s thinkin’…I wonder why he don’t write..?

Buying the red n tacky when I get off..I’ll repack both front hubs, since it’s fairly easy to take them apart. I’m really curious to see if this all comes down to a torque setting.
If 150 ft lbs makes it tight where there is no noticible hub movement, I’ll still pull those nuts to 250 :cautious:..as a permanent fix..Once they get there, I hope to Christ that I don’t have to remove them anytime soon..250 ft lbs is a ball buster.
 
  • Like
  • Wow
Reactions: 2 users
  • Sponsors (?)


The nut wasnt torqued to spec. From what I read, this nut needs to be something like 250 ft lbs..I didn’t have a torque wrench rated to that number 6 years ago ( but I do now) ..I just pulled it as tight as I could.

You don’t spose that the difference between tight, and fckin tight is gonna fix this do you?

295 ft/lbs if memory serves me right. It's a BS number for really fricken tight, and I had to facepalm every time someone would pay rediculous money for a torque wrench on this forum just to torque that one nut. It's a solid metal sleeve inside, and the torque is not going to affect the friction in the bearing. Set your impact on 4, and give it 3 ugga duggas. Don't use 5, because you might have to use 5 to get it back off later.

I've never seen an SN bearing fail that bad. Usually they just start to wear out, and the bearing will start walking a little bit. It's nothing to see a bearing go 30/1000s back and forth with a dial indicator.

Kurt
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 user
Torque is critical on a tapered roller bearing. It's not going to affect a double roller ball bearing.

Kurt
So...What your‘re saying is that the engineers at Ford, for whatever reason, just decided on a BS torque spec on a nut that doesn’t affect dick as long as it’s tight beyond whatever measure someone else would use to certify it as tight then?....

Why?

I mean, it’s gotta have some impact on some part of this equation...The nuts were so tight it took an extension on a breaker bar to loosen them ( for our purpose here, let’s just say that was 125 ft lbs) When “ rocking the tire” that thing moved a sht ton., the front end groaned, it vibrated, it wandered. When pulling the hub apart, there was no evidence of failure or wear of any kind...The ONLY thing missing was my omission of pulling that nut to some stupid torque figure ( looks to be 250 ft lbs)

Now, I wasn’t planning on getting greasy tonight, but I am sufficiently motivated to go down there and put that hub back together purely for the purpose of checking this.
 
295 ft/lbs if memory serves me right. It's a BS number for really fricken tight, and I had to facepalm every time someone would pay rediculous money for a torque wrench on this forum just to torque that one nut. It's a solid metal sleeve inside, and the torque is not going to affect the friction in the bearing. Set your impact on 4, and give it 3 ugga duggas. Don't use 5, because you might have to use 5 to get it back off later.

I've never seen an SN bearing fail that bad. Usually they just start to wear out, and the bearing will start walking a little bit. It's nothing to see a bearing go 30/1000s back and forth with a dial indicator.

Kurt

Torque is critical on a tapered roller bearing. It's not going to affect a double roller ball bearing.

Kurt


It's not a solid sleeve in the hub assembly, the two bearing halves meet in the middle.
bearing.jpg


This is why getting it TIGHT ENOUGH is important, and not getting it tight enough causes issues. Too tight would actually be difficult to achieve without stripping the threads on the spindle, but I'm sure some yahoo somewhere has done it.
 
  • Agree
Reactions: 1 user
For further illustration purposes, here's the relevant parts of a hub assembly I replaced years ago. I keep these two halves in the toolbox because they come in handy for driving in seals, other bearings, and as adapters when pressing things in and out on the press.
20201117_193530_HDR.jpg
20201117_193541.jpg



Like I said earlier in the thread, most technicians just impact them on and go to the next job, and that's fine, as long as it's tight enough.
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 user
So...What your‘re saying is that the engineers at Ford, for whatever reason, just decided on a BS torque spec on a nut that doesn’t affect dick as long as it’s tight beyond whatever measure someone else would use to certify it as tight then?....

Why?
Because engineers have to have a published number. There is technically a torque number for your spark plugs. There is absolutely no torque wrench in the world that is going to reach those 5.0 spark plugs when it's in the car with headers on it, but it has to have a number. 295ft/lbs = tight as hell. You might not have had them tight enough, but if you happened to hit 500 ft/lbs with an impact, it will be fine. Not to crap on anyone's parade, but I've had this car for 21 years now, had those bearings off more times than I can count, and I have always whacked them on with an impact, and never had a problem.

Kurt
 
Because engineers have to have a published number. There is technically a torque number for your spark plugs. There is absolutely no torque wrench in the world that is going to reach those 5.0 spark plugs when it's in the car with headers on it, but it has to have a number. 295ft/lbs = tight as hell. You might not have had them tight enough, but if you happened to hit 500 ft/lbs with an impact, it will be fine. Not to crap on anyone's parade, but I've had this car for 21 years now, had those bearings off more times than I can count, and I have always whacked them on with an impact, and never had a problem.

Kurt
EDIT:

Engineers actually have a reason behind of those numbers.

Some of those reasons are STUPID AS HELL, but they have a reason.

It's funny you bring up spark plugs, there's one brand I torque the spark plugs to spec on every single time, and that's BMW. I don't know how the hell the car knows, but every damned time I think "meh, I'll use the cordless ratchet, or that nice flex head SnapOn that makes the job easier/faster" the car in question will misfire.

So 23Nm it is. :D

I re-read your post and realized you weren't specifically addressing me on the wheel bearing. So I edited it, because I realized both that, and that other than your misunderstanding of the way the bearings are assembled, we're on the same page. There's no solid sleeve in that bearing, but once you reach sufficient ugga-dugga to make the two halves meet in the middle with enough tension, it's good, and a little more ain't hurting nothin.
 
Last edited:
It's not a solid sleeve in the hub assembly, the two bearing halves meet in the middle.
bearing.jpg


This is why getting it TIGHT ENOUGH is important, and not getting it tight enough causes issues. Too tight would actually be difficult to achieve without stripping the threads on the spindle, but I'm sure some yahoo somewhere has done it.
Sorry I didn't respond to your answer earlier. Thank you for the illustration. That gap drops to negative zero at 8 ft/lbs of torque, at which point, it becomes a solid sleeve through the center of the bearing. You can almost close that gap with your thumb and index figure on your bating hand.

Kurt
 
Sorry I didn't respond to your answer earlier. Thank you for the illustration. That gap drops to negative zero at 8 ft/lbs of torque, at which point, it becomes a solid sleeve through the center of the bearing. You can almost close that gap with your thumb and index figure on your bating hand.

Kurt
I doubt it does it with that little torque, but you're essentially right. Check out my edited post above. The long explanation on how it works is when the two halves are torqued together they pre-load the ball-bearings against them.
 
  • Agree
  • Useful
Reactions: 2 users
I doubt it does it with that little torque, but you're essentially right. Check out my edited post above. The long explanation on how it works is when the two halves are torqued together they pre-load the ball-bearings against them.
You haven't witnessed the strength of my bating hand. There is some truth in all of this. The bearings might not have been tight enough. My recommendation is 3 ugga duggas, which I have not had a problem with. 4 or 5 ugga duggas will probably be fine too. Does that sound about right?

Kurt
 
  • Haha
Reactions: 1 user
Well mystery solved.

The items ruled out in this case:
1. It wasn't the grease.
2. It wasn't the wear.
3. It wasn't the hub.
4. It wasn't the torque on the spindle nut.

20201117_205204.jpg

Mof...the hub assy had nothing to do with any of this...

These two bolts did.
20201117_205213.jpg

Loose enough to allow the spindle to move back and forth. Now so freakin tight, itll take a 3' long 3/4 breaker bar to remove them ( cause that's what I used to tighten them with)
While I should be all triumphant that I found it, all it does is remind me that I'll need the front end alignment rechecked.
Again.
I didnt even bother with disassembling the driver side spindle..since its not the problem.

Oh well,...on the bright side, the money spent on the unnecessary hubs will come back to me in the form of a refund..about 80 bucks..About the cost of the alignment.
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 users
It all sounded suspicious to me. That's a rookie mistake honestly. Those bolts need multiple ugga duggas to them torqued properly. FYI, your sway bar links aren't anywhere near tight enough either. Might want to throw some ugga duggas their way too.

Kurt
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 user
Well mystery solved.

The items ruled out in this case:
1. It wasn't the grease.
2. It wasn't the wear.
3. It wasn't the hub.
4. It wasn't the torque on the spindle nut.

20201117_205204.jpg

Mof...the hub assy had nothing to do with any of this...

These two bolts did.
20201117_205213.jpg

Loose enough to allow the spindle to move back and forth. Now so freakin tight, itll take a 3' long 3/4 breaker bar to remove them ( cause that's what I used to tighten them with)
While I should be all triumphant that I found it, all it does is remind me that I'll need the front end alignment rechecked.
Again.
I didnt even bother with disassembling the driver side spindle..since its not the problem.

Oh well,...on the bright side, the money spent on the unnecessary hubs will come back to me in the form of a refund..about 80 bucks..About the cost of the alignment.
Whoever did your alignment needs their ass whooped for leaving those loose (assuming they loosened them for camber adjustment).
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 user
The drag strip is open Sunday for Test and tune for sure. 11/22. One day after my 63rd birthday.
Maybe i’ll be surprised, but I’m setting myself up for a less than experience. The new Rotors will be here tomorro, and I’ll try to get the car out on Thursday to see if I have a fcked up alignment that causes dodgy handling at speed. If I do i’ll get it aligned Thursday, if not, I’ll do a couple of full pull test runs to see if the Tork troll is up to the task. If all of that checks out, I’ll take it to the track so I can run an AteOh.
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 user