1.9 Rear Beam Bearings

[jeeves 0]

Hi everyone

 

I have been following the rear beam rebuild guide on here which so far has been great but I cant get me inner bearings out at all!! I have tried hammering through from the other side but it just keeps breaking the edge off of the bearing. Does anyone know a good way to get these things out!!

 

Cheers

[Atari Boy 11]

All I know is that I paid someone in the end to shift them as they were a b@st@rds to move.

[welshpug 1,657]

I mash out one outer bearing, then put a trailing arm shaft in fat end first, thump it through till it comes out the other side with 3 bearings

[ricdat 0]

I removed mine a long time ago, but don't remember the details. Here are some tips though:

 

Use the largest diameter punch/drift/pipe that you can fit down there and still have it touch the inner wall of the suspension tube when pressed against the bearing you are trying to remove. This ensures maximum contact area between your punch and the bearing - this minimises the risk of breaking a chunk off the bearing edge.

 

Ensure your drift/punch/pipe has a nice flat, square end - ie, not rounded or beveled as that will tend to make it slip over the bearing lip.

 

Having said that, you don't want a sharp edge on the drift that will scrape metal off the inside of the suspension tube, so use a file to put a 1/4 or 1/2mm radius or bevel on the edge.

 

When hammering, lever the drift so it presses hard against the suspension tube's inner wall (so the drift won't skip over the bearing edge). If this is too difficult to achieve, you can stick a long screwdriver up the other end that lightly wedges the drift to one side; you will need someone lightly holding the screwdriver in so that it doesn't bounce out at the first hammer blow.

 

The ultimate though is with a small change to Tip #2: because the drift/punch/pipe is slightly angled when inserted into the suspension tube. its contact face will not quite be square to the bearing - so you could grind the end of the drift slightly off square so it ends up being square to the bearing.

 

Rick

1992 205GTI S3

[jeeves 0]

Cheers for ur help guys I think il need to have another go at it using ur advice and see if i can get them to finally shift

[pug_ham 244 3 Cars]

I usually use either a dead trailing arm shaft like welshpug or a socket on an extension to knock them into the centre of the tube & then smack them right out one side using an old torsion bar as a drift.

 

Graham.

[Tom Fenton 1,542]

I made a special tool for doing this, works a treat for getting the old ones out and installing the new ones.

 

[jeeves 0]

Do u just smash the bearing into the middle of the beam tube with that??

[Tom Fenton 1,542]

I don't smash anything with it, but yes I do drive them into the middle of the tube. Then with a long bar you can turn them through 90 degrees which makes them easy to drive out of the other end of the tube. Obviously once you have got them out they have had it.