I thought I was going to have a fairly easy time removing my hub, but I can't get the axle to slip back as I pull out the hub. It seems to be rusted together. From what I've been reading here, the only trouble people run into is getting the rotor off the hub. I have the three bolts out and the hub assembly moves around but I can't punch the axle back at all. I have a home brew of kerosene and motor oil that has always penetrated rusted nuts and bolts as good or better than commercial products, but it hasn't helped tonight. Am I missing something?

2000 F150 4x4 ABS

Axle/spindle nut is off
three hub bolts are off
brake calipers off and hung out of the way

I have been able to get the hub out almost an 1/8" and shimmed it there so I could take a block of hickory and a hammer to the spindle/drive shaft to try to get it moving, but it's a no go.

 

I just replaced the hub on my truck a few days ago so I know what you're going through. I had a friend wedge a hammer against the back of hub on one side to apply pressure while I hit the other side with a 3 pound sledge. After about 10 minutes of nonstops beating the crap out of it, it finally came off. If yours is rusted on then I can't really help, but I would reccomend just beating the crap out of it for a while and see if that axle slips out at all. If not, you can try heating it with a propane torch. That'll usually get it to break. Good luck.

 

Thanks. I'd have to assume you used a wood block or something to keep the axle from mushrooming, or did you replace it too? I'm just trying to get a feel for just how hard you were whacking the beast.

 

I'm not exactly sure about what you mean by "mushrooming". I was not hitting the axleshaft, I was hitting the backside of the hub away from the axle. It took about 10 minutes with all of my strength to get it off.

Also, what size socket did you end up using? 7/16 seems just a wee bit small. I had to guess while at the auto store. I picked a 35mm and it was a perfect fit.

 

I found a 1 3/8" at the local Tractor Supply for $7 that fit perfect. (I bought the 1 7/16" also but I'll take it back later). The cheapest 35mm I could find at an auto parts store was $20!

I read that you are supposed to knock the axle back as you pull the hub out to keep it from over extending the shaft.

 

I must have misread that. I thought it just said "7/16" not "1 7/16". I paid $13 for that socket. But yeah I kinda thought I shouldn't risk overextending the CV joints. If you go back about a week, I posted a thread about noises that my hub/bearing was making. It sounded exactly like a bad CV joint. I just assumed that I would have to replace the axle also. Anyway, I replaced the hub and I have no more noises so I guess 1:the axle was okay to begin with, and 2:beating it like I did didn't do any immediate damage. I just didn't care what I did to the axle because I planned on replacing it. If you can ovoid doing it like I did, you should. I'm having a little trouble picturing why you can't pound the axle out any more. Is it possible that the axle is compressed all the way? Maybe try unbolting the other end of the axleshaft from the differential. Other than that I would just say continue hitting it and never underestimate the power of a propane torch.

 

I tried heating it and still no joy. I'm about ready to put it back together and take it to a shop.

 

I don't really know what else to tell you. I'm rather surprised that nobody else has chimed in here. Surely someone else has had this problem. I guess all I can say is good luck...

 

Put a good puller on the hub and drive the spindle back into the hub. The splines sometimes sieze to the hub on high-mileage vehicles. Use a thin layer of anti-sieze on the new splines ot prevent it from happening again.

In lieu of a puller, put the nut back on the spindle to prevent boogering up the threads and re-seat the bearing in the spindle so it's solid, and whack the end of the spindle.

Good luck!

-Joe

 

When i did mine I put the puller on first to loosen up the axle, then took the hub bolts off. Then the hub wouldn't come. Half a can of PB Blaster and a 3lb. hammer for 20 minutes did the trick.
And GIJoe has good ideas with the nut back on and a BFH. I'd still use a buffer on the nut though, nice steel block would work.

 

I finally got the #$%& thing off tonight. I had to make my own puller cause I'm a cheap bastage. I used an old hub from my 8N Ford tractor, a piece of 1/2" steel, and some good bolts to rig up the puller. I used a 20 inch breaker bar and thought I was going to twist the 1/2" bolts off cause I was giving it just about all I had. When it let go, the dang thing popped like a shotgun and still was hard to finish pulling off. I don't think I've had anything stuck that solid before.

The truck isn't high milage, only 41k miles. It looks like the factory didn't get the spline completely covered with anti seize compound or whatever that gray stuff was. There was some rust, but not as bad as I thought there would be based on how hard it was to pull. I cleaned it up and put some anti seize on it and the new one slipped right on with no fuss at all.

I've got everything back together and almost ready to go but I've run into one big snag. The OEM bearing torques at 148 ft/lbs, IIRC. This new bearing came with instructions stating to preload to 180 ft/lbs. My torque wrench only goes to 150. I've always been able to tighten by feel pretty accurately on smaller stuff (won lots of bets that way), but I don't believe I should guess at 180 ft/lbs, especially since I've never had a torque wrench big enough to check stuff that tight.

None of the stores in town have anything over 150 ft/lbs. The closest Sears is over an hour round trip and I won't have time to do that until the weekend...not to mention the $100 for a new wrench.

 

Don't worry about it... how much do you weigh? Figure about 195 lbs, right? Take a standard 3-ft breaker bar and stand on it 12" away from the socket end. That'll be close enough. As long as you don't strip the threads out of the nut or off the shaft, you're fine. You can't over-torque the bearing as it bottoms out on itself when you tighten it down. You just need to get the bearing bottomed out.

-Joe

 

Sounds like a winner to me!

 

close to what did it for my truck

bpblaster no help parts puller block on wood and 4lb hammer and torch its what made the diff

 

Drove the truck today. The new hub definately helped with the noise. However, there is still some noise there. The bad bearing was so loud that it was masking the other sounds.

I'm sure the OEM tires are causing some of it, but I believe there's still another problem because rotating the tires doesn't change the noise level that seems to eminate from the front driver's side. I've decided to drive it until something breaks or gets too loud to bear again.