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wheel bearings?

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2012 9:41 am
by Ammo
How do you know if the rear wheel bearings are on the way out?

Since my car is now quiet, I can hear a constant drone from the rear, that doesn't appear to go away if I apply the hand brake.

So I'm thinking possible wheel bearings?

Expensive job?

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2012 9:51 am
by NafemanNathan
Sounds like it could be. Try jacking it up and spinning each wheel. Should be quite obvious then. Trouble is whilst driving the sound obviously resonates through the car, so even if it sounds like it's coming from the back, it might not be.

Never had it done on the Prelude, but I had an itemised quote for repairing my knackered old Polo when it had failed the MOT badly. They had quoted a mere £15 labour for replacing the rear wheel bearing on that and just a couple of quid for the bearing.

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2012 9:52 am
by Ted
according to auto data 0.7 hours to fit and my online ordering says choice of 2 retail £43.20 or £106.56. :shock: big difference aye. could be a tyre mind.

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2012 10:00 am
by jozefsan
move wheel vertically and horizontally and look for play/ movement, careful with cheap replacement i seen few times people lost wheel because of china bearings

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2012 10:01 am
by Ted
jozefsan wrote:move wheel vertically and horizontally and look for play/ movement, careful with cheap replacement i seen few times people lost wheel because of china bearings
surely china bearings would just crack the first time you hit a pothole ;)

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2012 10:15 am
by NafemanNathan
Maybe he means ceramic ;-)

Yeah, I recall seeing rear bearings on ebay for well over £100 now you come to mention it. I guess the Polo wasn't quite a Prelude ;-)

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2012 10:17 am
by Merlin
Or that thay are low quality Chinese made products?

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2012 10:19 am
by NafemanNathan
Merlin wrote:Or that thay are low quality Chinese made products?
Of course that's what he means! :lol:

Sorry, we did our annoying thing again didn't we? :oops:

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2012 10:21 am
by indigolemon
I did both rear bearings on mine recently, and yes - after extensive reading the overall message was "don't buy cheap bearings". I got mine via Jozef in the end, and they are win 8-)

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2012 10:32 am
by nucleustylzlude
Yeah the rears are usually sold as whole hubs, the difference in prices is for ABS or non ABS ludes as it'll come with the ABS rings then.

Front's are just the bearing to change.

Check for play is the best way, hard to pinpoint if you have other knackered parts of the suspension though, like bushes and the like.