Non-serviceable front wheel bearing - only words in manual - throwaway van?

More work than necessary, plus the added cost of the alignment.
Four bolts hold the hub to he knuckle, no need to mess with tie
rod separators and guessing at camber.
This wheel bearing is about as easy to swap as it gets.

 

The steering "knuckle."

Let's see;
Two nuts and bolts at the top for the strut.
Tie rod end.
Ball joint.

versus

Four hub to knuckle bolts.

Your way is a whole lot harder and screws up the alignment.

 

Not.

 

Amazing. Talk about leading a horse to water and having it refuse to
drink. Somebody shows you that the actual bearings are available, and
shows you where to get them, and shows you how inexpensive they are.
Somebody else corroborates. And what do you do? You bleat about how
they're obviously "the wrong parts", because you (mis)read something in
your service manual.

For your willful ignorance, you deserve to spend a lot of unnecessary
money on this repair.

 

You misread what I wrote. Aside from being rude, here you are simply
mistaken and arrogant.

rockauto.com had the wrong parts listed in their data base. they
confirmed this when i called them for the correct parts.

i did not misread nothing in the service manual because there was
nothing to read. that was the entire point of my post which you also
missed.

additionally, you were also wrong that i did not know about the
bearings and how inexpensive they are. if you read my original post, i
said the bearing was $90 which is what you later said for rockauto. so
how you "bleat" that you told me anything? you only told me what i had
originally posted but apparently your reading comprehension is limited,
except for what you, yourself, write.

i did not misread the shop manual. there was nothing in the shop manual
except the bearing was not-serviceable. they made a mistake in leaving
out what to do next to effect a repair when a bearing is bad.

why are you so rude? your ignorance about what actually was posted is
matched only by your arrogance. what is wrong with you? you have a
great deal of knowledge about chrysler cars but no people skills
whatsoever. you misinterpret and misread the posts but not the
mechanical parts themselves. interesting.

 

I found what should have been in the Chrysler minivan shop manual but
was left out. This information is probably coming from Alldata.com.

http://autorepair.about.com/library/faqs/bl632h.htm

Dodge Caravan [Plymouth Voyager] Front Wheel Bearings

Q. I have a 1992 Dodge Caravan, 3.0 liter, automatic transmission and
190,000 miles. There is a growling from the front wheels. My mechanic
told me the bearings, left and right, are going bad and need to be
replaced. This would involve a replacement of the "hub assembly" on
both sides, $100.00 apiece, and $200.00 labor.

Can I do this work myself? I'm handy and have replaced pads, rotors,
starters, alternators, and such before. Does it require special tools
or superhuman strength? Tell me I can save $200.00?

Bradley

A. You can save $200.00 if you are up to the task. I'll outline the
procedure and then you can decide if you are up to the challenge.

This hub and bearing assembly is being used on certain extended
wheelbase Caravan, Voyager and Mini Ram Vans. This unit is serviced as
a complete assembly, and is attached to the steering knuckle by four
mounting screws that are removed from the rear of the knuckle assembly.

Removal

Remove cotter pin, nut lock, and spring washer.

Loosen hub nut while the vehicle is on the floor with the brakes
applied.

The hub and drive shaft are splined together through the knuckle
(bearing) and retained by the hub nut.

Raise vehicle.

Remove hub nut, washer, and wheel and tire assembly.

Disconnect tie rod end from steering arm.

Remove clamp bolt securing ball joint stud into steering knuckle.

Remove caliper guide pins and separate caliper assembly from braking
disc. SUPPORT CALIPER WITH WIRE HOOK AND NOT BY HYDRAULIC HOSE. Remove
brake rotor.

Separate ball joint stud from knuckle assembly. Pull knuckle assembly
out and away from drive shaft. NOTE: Care must be taken not to separate
the
Inner C/V joint during this operation. Do not allow drive shaft to hang
by inner C/V joint, drive shaft must be supported.

Remove the four hub and bearing assembly mounting screws from rear of
steering knuckle.

Remove hub and bearing assembly. Replacement of the grease seal is
recommended whenever this service is performed.


[Pretty good and fairly accurate. The $100 is about the price from Pep
Boys which is actually 89.99 + tax. In my state, that would come to
$95+. Also, the part can be ordered from Rockauto.com for $82 +
shipping, which would come to around $90. I don't know who makes the
part from Pep Boys. If it's also BCA National, then it's a matter of
time and convenience and about $6 at most.]

 

In rec.autos.makers.chrysler on 20 Aug 2005 12:32:51 -0700

FTR, if NAPA is 50% more, then Rockauto is only 33% less.

I'm alert to this sort of thing, because advertisers and politicians
use variations of this seeming oddity to confuse people.

If you email me, please let me know whether
or not you are posting the same letter.
If necessary, change domain to erols.com.

Directions are given as if you know nothing.
There's a big range here but I don't know who knows what.

 

Here's the URL with the added info from AllData:

http://autorepair.about.com/li brary/faqs/bl632h.htm

It's hard to say where the added info came from that AllData added. It
was missing from the Chrysler factory shop manual for 1994
Plymouth/Dodge minivans. It's possible that AllData got the info from
an earlier shop manual or a later one and just added it since the
procedure is the same across the relevant years. It's also possible
that AllData got it from a third party manual somewhere? Just asking,
don't know much about AllData since I have not had to subscribe to them
yet.

 

i must have been upset by your rudeness to commit a double negative.
i did not misread anything because there was not anything to read.
that reads better.

it is interesting. your encyclopedic knowledge of cars combined with
your almost complete lack of empathy or rapport, as though people are
just cross-threaded bolts to be discarded. i pick up on this because i
have the same affliction, although not to the degree that you do. it's
called little professor syndrome.

 

Ummm - that's not AllData. Why would you even say it was? Not even the
same format that you get with an AllData subscription. So far, until
someone proves me wrong, I'm sticking to what I said: For service
procedures, if it ain't in the FSM, it ain't on AllData.

Bill Putney
(To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my
address with the letter 'x')

 

I noticed it, but I thought it was intentional and actually clever.

Your point was that there was nothing in the manual (on the subject).
Therefore, there was nothing to be misread, i.e., you "did not misread
nothing" since there was nothing there to misread. Also, the powers
that be in the grammar world have declared that double negatives are now
legitimate (maybe only in informal speech?). I do technical writing
where I report the results of certain types of testing. The wording has
to be very precise and deliberate Believe me - you do this kind of
writing with the grammar checker turned off. Although, if I can
re-structure a sentence to avoid a double negative without losing
accuracy or clarity, I will do so, once in a while there are instances
where using a double negative is the most accurate and concise way to
describe something. It is also now acceptable to intentionally split an
infintive. 8^)

How about "that that": "It was determined that that bolt was loose
before the start of testing."? "If it were possible..." is
gramamtically correct even though you would think the awkward sounding
"If it was possible..." is called for. It's called past subjunctive mood.

Bill Putney
(To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my
address with the letter 'x')

 

Your point is what troubled me. This is why I originally said it was
_probably_ AllData. I think I said that. I meant that this URL is using
data that they say came from AllData. There is that sentence at the
bottom of their web page mentioning this.

In any case, my best guess is that it might come from Chilton and that
AllData incorporated it? The URL says AllData added something so maybe
it added Chilton. If not, then it's probably from Chilton originally
and what he posted was only Chilton and directly from Chilton. It's not
clear where he got the information but I guess I could ask the web site
person for that info.

For sure, it's not in my Chrysler factory shop manual [FSM] for 1994.
That I'm pretty sure of. Nor is it in any other supplemental factory
shop manuals. That I'm reasonably sure of, but not positive. It's
unlikely it would be in the fuel injection, the transmission, and the
body diagnostic manuals.

Since the web site does not mention Haynes, that leaves only Chilton.
If AllData does not add anything, then I guess one has to purchase the
FSM and also the Chilton manual to cover everything. Although the
Chilton manual is not often helpful for me, it may discuss things in a
way that is easier than the shop manual.

Your point again is well taken. What manuals does AllData use? If they
have a cross-license with Chilton and Chrysler, that would be nice.
Since Chilton and Chrysler now use CDROM's, it would also be doable
from a technical point of view, as opposed to the onerous scanning in
of pages.

 

Excellent pickup on your part. I sensed something was wrong when I
posted that but I was not in a mood to pick it apart. Thanks for the
keen observation.

They sure do. It's not statistics, at least not statistical inference,
it's just plain, vanilla numbers. A great one is to use percentages
without rates or raw numbers, such as female crime went up 1000% in the
last year! This could mean that 1 woman to 10 women were arrested for
certain crimes, which pales before 10,000 men. That last example came
from academia, which should know better and have high standards. But
that is not as usual as one would like.

 

P.S.

To answer your question exactly, at the bottom of the web page, it
states:

"Additional Information provided courtesy of AllDATA"

So that why I said that.

Web page: http://autorepair.about.com/library/faqs/bl632h.htm

 

Thanks. I'm sorry now I deleted that post.

Why not "It was determined that this particular bolt.." I see, "that
that," is really the shortest way.

About the subjunctive, I see the indicative being used, and it always
sounds quite jarring. I would think the subjunctive mood, in your
example, the past tense, is called for. But I rarely see it in writing
anymore. I gather it's considered quaint.

But not for me. I think, hmmm, is this hypothetical or real,
subjunctive or indicative. I really do.

 

Is that line possibly boilerplate that appears at the bottom of all of
their articles? I have 4 vehicle-specific subscriptions to AllData, and
the procedural stuff is right out of the FSM with no embellishment or
additons as far as I've been able to tell.

Factory FSM - I have seen nothing that would appear to be from any
aftermarket manual (thankfully).

Bill Putney
(To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my
address with the letter 'x')

 

Yeah - if the customer bleeds on it in the preliminary review, I
typically end up re-writing the sentence to something like that for the
final release.

Bill Putney
(To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my
address with the letter 'x')

 

Low tolerance for willful ignorance.

We have never met; you have no knowledge of my people skills. If my words
on your screen bother you, avoid my posts.

Or perhaps, in your case, we could call it "armchair psychologist
syndrome".

 

I see I did not delete my post in time. So let me answer your reply.

Those are pretty strong words. Can you back them up with thought? Where
was I willfully ignorant? From where I am posting, the willful
ignorance is yours, matched only by you willful arrogance - to continue
the usual ad hominem metaphor.

We have met, via the posting. The only difference is that we have not
face to face. It's possible that your facial expressions would expose a
sympatico that does not come through in your posts. That is entirely
possible, unlikely, but theoretically possible.

I could avoid your posts. But why? You have an encyclopedic knowledge
of cars coupled with an ignorance that is inversely proportional to
your knowledge when dealing with people.

You thoughtlessly started an argument with me here because you read
incorrectly. You jumped to conclusions because you misread my posts. I
was not criticizing your suggestion of Rockauto. I was only pointing
out that their online data base was wrong, whereas, their telephone
line, on a weekend, was superb.

You cannot admit you made a mistake, can you? Why not? You did make a
mistake. Your mistake was not about cars, but about what I wrote.

I am in my armchair, but I also have this affliction. I often do what
you do so that's why I recognize this. You seem interested in
knowledge. This is something you might want to read up on. Its
technical name is Asperger's Syndrome.

 

Interesting, not knowing how bad that hub and knuckle assembly could have
been bent due to an accident.. the bearing is less then $60 bucks, it is
removed without disturbing the camber setting, Now your gonna buy a used
knuckle, and then realign the vehicle possibly with a faulty knuckle??/