Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[mr_gr1mm]

Hey guys,

I've been trying to get my capri compliant for NYS inspection and it turns out the bearings are bad - so I need to replace both front/rear bearings + pads + rotors. I have a list of parts that I think will work. Can someone just look this over and tell me whether or not these parts will fit? This will be my first attempt at any brake work and some of the parts on RockAuto are a little confusing. My main concerns are:

* Do I need to replace the spindle nut? Or can I just reuse the existing nuts?
* Are the rear inner & outer bearing seals the same? RockAuto has the inner/outer seals listed separately - but nothing available listed as "outer". Only "Rear" and "Rear Inner".
* What is up with the extra "hardware" that comes with the front brake pads? I assume that is necessary? Not all pads have the hardware.

(sorry for the links, I don't know how to embed images on this forum)
Parts List 1

Edit: I was looking things over a bit more and I think I answered one of my own questions. It seems the hardware kit is necessary for the front brakes - I still am not sure about the rear bearing seals so I'm going to wait on buying those until I get a response here. For now, I am going to do the front rotors/pads/bearings as those are the immediate issue. (I also picked up the rear rotors because rockauto is almost out - only 2 left!). Here is what I have now:

Parts List 2

I also noticed that Raybestos had a kit for the front rotors/pads/hw - so that saved me a little bit!

Thanks!

[greywolf27030]

Be sure and get someone with experience to do your bearings. They require special spacers to set the preload and a special tool to determine the thickness spacer needed. A guy by the name of Paul Short in NC does this as a service. Ship him yours and he gets them right back to you. Otherwise, you'll risk short bearing life and even ruined knuckles.

[mr_gr1mm]

omg thank you for this! Do you have his contact information? I assume I'll have to have him go through the same process for the rear bearings as well? Also do you have any input on my questions? I want to make sure I am getting the correct rear bearing seals. Thanks!

[Rocketman]

You can DIY the wheel bearings. I have an out-dated and somewhat incorrect guide sticky'd here:

https://teamcapri.com/forum/index.php?topic=2718.0

The next time I have to do them (be it on my 94XR2 or on esheperd's xr2) I will film it and upload it to youtube, it's important enough to deserve a good video on it.

Mr_Gr1mm, I'm not sure where you are in NYS but if you don't want to mess with it you could bring them down to me, I'm in NE PA. Or the car, I should have room in my shop if I clean up a bit. I have the Ford special service tool for measuring pre-load and the ability to manufacture a different spacer if needed.

In my experience the spacer it came with is usually OK. The factory manual lists ~29 spacers, but if I remember right the measured preload has a tolerance of ~5 different acceptable spacer sizes so there's quite the wiggle room even in the factory specs.
The spacer has more to do with the tolerances of how the knuckle was initially machined, bearing's mfg tolerances are waaay tighter and *shouldn't* appreciably move spacer sizes. But I suppose that would be my opinion as amateur engineer/machinist, others may dispute this, so there's my disclaimer.

The rear wheel bearings are nowhere near as complicated as the fronts, the only issue you might have is removing the inner race from the spindle, but I think those are a slip-fit as opposed to press fit like the fronts. The outer bearing's race is tapped/pressed into the rotor (which is also the hub) which you won't need to remove if using new rotors.
The spindle nut one side in the rear is reverse threaded. Both fronts are conventional thread. Spindle/axle nuts are re-usable as long as they're not butchered. I have a special little punch/chisel I ground to neatly un-stake them.

[mr_gr1mm]

Thanks Rocketman that is very generous of you. I will take a look at that guide you posted. I am near the Syracuse area so not too far from you.. however I don't think I'd want to be driving the capri too far now that I don't even have an inspection sticker (mechanic removed my old sticker). For the rear bearings, I found this youtube video that seems pretty straightforward - not sure what you guys think of it but it seems easy enough for me to follow (only issue for me would be removing the bearing/race from the spindle). As for the fronts - I wasn't even aware that there is a spacer (no mention of that on the rockauto.com parts list). Would you possibly be willing to mate the bearing/race and hub together if I ship my parts to you? I would pay you for your trouble as well as all shipping costs as you'd be helping me out big time!

Edit: I read through your guide and I can see the dilemma (definitely glad I am not trusting a minimum wage mechanic to do this job). I am a bit confused by one thing: are there two sets of bearings/races for each front tire? If so, your guide doesn't show installation of the bearing on the knuckle side - I assume it is the same size as the hub side bearing? The only part about this process that really scares me is removing the old bearings/races. I don't trust myself enough to do that without damaging something since this would be my first time. I'd prefer to take the hub and knuckle off and just ship them down to you along with the new bearings/races/seals, so let me know if you would be willing to do that.

[EShepherd]

Thanks Rocketman that is very generous of you. I will take a look at that guide you posted. I am near the Syracuse area so not too far from you.. however I don't think I'd want to be driving the capri too far now that I don't even have an inspection sticker (mechanic removed my old sticker). For the rear bearings, I found this youtube video that seems pretty straightforward - not sure what you guys think of it but it seems easy enough for me to follow (only issue for me would be removing the bearing/race from the spindle). As for the fronts - I wasn't even aware that there is a spacer (no mention of that on the rockauto.com parts list). Would you possibly be willing to mate the bearing/race and hub together if I ship my parts to you? I would pay you for your trouble as well as all shipping costs as you'd be helping me out big time!

Edit: I read through your guide and I can see the dilemma (definitely glad I am not trusting a minimum wage mechanic to do this job). I am a bit confused by one thing: are there two sets of bearings/races for each front tire? If so, your guide doesn't show installation of the bearing on the knuckle side - I assume it is the same size as the hub side bearing? The only part about this process that really scares me is removing the old bearings/races. I don't trust myself enough to do that without damaging something since this would be my first time. I'd prefer to take the hub and knuckle off and just ship them down to you along with the new bearings/races/seals, so let me know if you would be willing to do that.

Hey so I think we have a thing here we could all work out. I too am nearby to you both, and also have keys and access to a dealership garage and tools whenever I want. (my tools, my bosses shop. But I'm his bread winner, so I get free reign lol) Hydraulic shop press & alignment rack included. Perhaps we could work out a thing where we all meet there on a Sunday, when we are closed. Matt can do the thing,, and we could film the thing (and learn). Then if either of your guys Capri's are up for the drive (mine sure isn't!), I can align them after.

I'm located near the NJ, NY, PA border. The shop is Nissan of Yorktown Heights. If it's not as close as I think it is, we could always just raid Matt's shop one weekend too.

Also yes, once my little car is running, I do plan on bugging my boss to let us do a car show/meet here eventually.

EDIT- MR. Grimm, I forgot to add. It may be your lucky day man. I have a New York state inspection license. You get that Capri to my shop (and let me take it for a quick drive), and you get a sticker. PM me I'll send you my phone number. As long as the thing's not a death trap, I don't wanna risk my license.

[greywolf27030]

You can DIY the wheel bearings. I have an out-dated and somewhat incorrect guide sticky'd here:

https://teamcapri.com/forum/index.php?topic=2718.0

The next time I have to do them (be it on my 94XR2 or on esheperd's xr2) I will film it and upload it to youtube, it's important enough to deserve a good video on it.

Mr_Gr1mm, I'm not sure where you are in NYS but if you don't want to mess with it you could bring them down to me, I'm in NE PA. Or the car, I should have room in my shop if I clean up a bit. I have the Ford special service tool for measuring pre-load and the ability to manufacture a different spacer if needed.

In my experience the spacer it came with is usually OK. The factory manual lists ~29 spacers, but if I remember right the measured preload has a tolerance of ~5 different acceptable spacer sizes so there's quite the wiggle room even in the factory specs.
The spacer has more to do with the tolerances of how the knuckle was initially machined, bearing's mfg tolerances are waaay tighter and *shouldn't* appreciably move spacer sizes. But I suppose that would be my opinion as amateur engineer/machinist, others may dispute this, so there's my disclaimer.

The rear wheel bearings are nowhere near as complicated as the fronts, the only issue you might have is removing the inner race from the spindle, but I think those are a slip-fit as opposed to press fit like the fronts. The outer bearing's race is tapped/pressed into the rotor (which is also the hub) which you won't need to remove if using new rotors.
The spindle nut one side in the rear is reverse threaded. Both fronts are conventional thread. Spindle/axle nuts are re-usable as long as they're not butchered. I have a special little punch/chisel I ground to neatly un-stake them.

This is great information. Combined with the ability to turn knuckles for a big brake upgrade is really cool.

[mr_gr1mm]

Thanks Rocketman that is very generous of you. I will take a look at that guide you posted. I am near the Syracuse area so not too far from you.. however I don't think I'd want to be driving the capri too far now that I don't even have an inspection sticker (mechanic removed my old sticker). For the rear bearings, I found this youtube video that seems pretty straightforward - not sure what you guys think of it but it seems easy enough for me to follow (only issue for me would be removing the bearing/race from the spindle). As for the fronts - I wasn't even aware that there is a spacer (no mention of that on the rockauto.com parts list). Would you possibly be willing to mate the bearing/race and hub together if I ship my parts to you? I would pay you for your trouble as well as all shipping costs as you'd be helping me out big time!

Edit: I read through your guide and I can see the dilemma (definitely glad I am not trusting a minimum wage mechanic to do this job). I am a bit confused by one thing: are there two sets of bearings/races for each front tire? If so, your guide doesn't show installation of the bearing on the knuckle side - I assume it is the same size as the hub side bearing? The only part about this process that really scares me is removing the old bearings/races. I don't trust myself enough to do that without damaging something since this would be my first time. I'd prefer to take the hub and knuckle off and just ship them down to you along with the new bearings/races/seals, so let me know if you would be willing to do that.

Hey so I think we have a thing here we could all work out. I too am nearby to you both, and also have keys and access to a dealership garage and tools whenever I want. (my tools, my bosses shop. But I'm his bread winner, so I get free reign lol) Hydraulic shop press & alignment rack included. Perhaps we could work out a thing where we all meet there on a Sunday, when we are closed. Matt can do the thing,, and we could film the thing (and learn). Then if either of your guys Capri's are up for the drive (mine sure isn't!), I can align them after.

I'm located near the NJ, NY, PA border. The shop is Nissan of Yorktown Heights. If it's not as close as I think it is, we could always just raid Matt's shop one weekend too.

Also yes, once my little car is running, I do plan on bugging my boss to let us do a car show/meet here eventually.

EDIT- MR. Grimm, I forgot to add. It may be your lucky day man. I have a New York state inspection license. You get that Capri to my shop (and let me take it for a quick drive), and you get a sticker. PM me I'll send you my phone number. As long as the thing's not a death trap, I don't wanna risk my license.

I'm feeling very lucky to have a community full of people that are so willing to help out! Your Nissan shop is over 4 hours from my location though, and I don't think my capri is necessarily up for the drive (my biggest concern is driving all that way with no inspection sticker and getting pulled over). I might be arsed to drive to where Rocketman is since Scranton PA is only about 2.5 hours from me and it sounds like he's near there. I need to make sure my current bearings will make the trip though - cause allegedly I failed inspection due to "bearing play" in the RF wheel. 

[EShepherd]

If you have the ability to jack up just that corner of the car, it's super easy to check. Just make sure the wheel is fully off the ground. Grab it at the 3 and 9 o'clock positions, and try to rock the wheel in and out. You don't want to turn the steering rack, just sort of shake the wheel. Sometimes, you will even get play on the other axis (so check the 12 & 6 o'clock). A little bit of play isn't the end of the world. If it isn't making noise and isn't much play, then I'd be willing to drive it 2.5 hours to get it fixed. If it's bad, you'll likely be able to tell when you do this check. The wheel will have a significant amount of slop in it, and you may start hearing banging/feeling the car walk around the road. That's when it's time to stop driving.

I'd rather take it to Matt than to a Mazda dealership at this point. He definitely sounds like he's far more familiar with the oddball setup than anyone else you're likely to find.

[mr_gr1mm]

Yeah so I just checked it and there is some play on both the X and Y axis.. not a terrible amount. I haven't really noticed any noise when driving (but this car still makes a lot of noise overall, so it could be making noise that I just can't hear). I did notice however that it seems to be slightly drifting toward the bad bearing. I thought it was the alignment but I realize now that it is probably the bad bearing. I think it could probably make it to PA without an issue.. but I just don't know if I'm willing to risk getting pulled over without a sticker, not to mention the possibility of something going wrong on the way down.. at the very least I'm going to try and replace the bearings by following the guide posted above and re-using whatever spacer I already have. Beyond that, if there's any way for me to ship some of these parts down and get some assistance I'll be up for that.

[Rocketman]

You're welcome to ship your knuckles to me, along with all the parts (shipping everything, new bearings/rotors might get pricey??) or have the new parts shipped to me?
Or remove them and drive them down in a non-capri vehicle, lol
I'm about 45mins from Scranton, more specifically in the E. Stroudsburg area

If there's detectable play in the bearing it's best not to drive it - the bearing race will start to eat into the hub and render it scrap (maybe some insane mad science sprinkled with black magic could fix it up in a pinch) Years ago I bought a set of spare knuckle assemblies from a Festiva guy years ago to use as cores for doing Galant upgrades, alas both hubs were junk. (he did not know that, unfortunate for the both of us)

It is really not that oddball of a setup for this vintage of vehicle, but wildly inconvenient and sure to confuse most reasonably knowledgeable modern technician. Most are used to single press-bearings but today the unitized bearing/hub assembly is king

[mr_gr1mm]

You're welcome to ship your knuckles to me, along with all the parts (shipping everything, new bearings/rotors might get pricey??) or have the new parts shipped to me?
Or remove them and drive them down in a non-capri vehicle, lol
I'm about 45mins from Scranton, more specifically in the E. Stroudsburg area

If there's detectable play in the bearing it's best not to drive it - the bearing race will start to eat into the hub and render it scrap (maybe some insane mad science sprinkled with black magic could fix it up in a pinch) Years ago I bought a set of spare knuckle assemblies from a Festiva guy years ago to use as cores for doing Galant upgrades, alas both hubs were junk. (he did not know that, unfortunate for the both of us)

It is really not that oddball of a setup for this vintage of vehicle, but wildly inconvenient and sure to confuse most reasonably knowledgeable modern technician. Most are used to single press-bearings but today the unitized bearing/hub assembly is king

I like your idea of removing everything and taking it down in a separate car - so I'll plan on doing that. I am still waiting for parts, but once I have those I'll send you a DM and we can make a weekend of it!

[mr_gr1mm]

You're welcome to ship your knuckles to me, along with all the parts (shipping everything, new bearings/rotors might get pricey??) or have the new parts shipped to me?
Or remove them and drive them down in a non-capri vehicle, lol
I'm about 45mins from Scranton, more specifically in the E. Stroudsburg area

If there's detectable play in the bearing it's best not to drive it - the bearing race will start to eat into the hub and render it scrap (maybe some insane mad science sprinkled with black magic could fix it up in a pinch) Years ago I bought a set of spare knuckle assemblies from a Festiva guy years ago to use as cores for doing Galant upgrades, alas both hubs were junk. (he did not know that, unfortunate for the both of us)

It is really not that oddball of a setup for this vintage of vehicle, but wildly inconvenient and sure to confuse most reasonably knowledgeable modern technician. Most are used to single press-bearings but today the unitized bearing/hub assembly is king

I like your idea of removing everything and taking it down in a separate car - so I'll plan on doing that. I am still waiting for parts, but once I have those I'll send you a DM and we can make a weekend of it!

I sent you a PM a while back so we can coordinate a meetup. No rush, just hoping to get down there before the weather turns to snow. Let me know either way - cheers!