Wheel bearing GEN2 tool

[T5R92011]

This weekend I am likely going to be doing the front passenger wheel bearing on my S40 T5. As someone who can't stand letting other people work on my car, I thought I'd just buy the tools to do this myself.

After initially thinking I'd need a hydraulic press, I did a bit more research and found that the easiest way to do these is with a 'GEN2' Ford/Mazda/Volvo 78mm wheel bearing tool.

On these cars, the hub and the wheel bearing come as one unit that must be pressed into the steering knuckle. The steering knuckle can bend if you use a hydraulic press, so you are supposed to use this type of tool. The tool both extracts the old hub/bearing and also installs the new hub/bearing.

I've purchased the below tool on ebay for £72.00. Worth noting that the bigger P3 Volvo's of this era (XC60, S80,V70 etc) and larger Fords of the EUCD platform need the larger 82mm tool.


https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Wheel-Hub...4AAOSwVL1V~C9S

I have paired this with an SKF front wheel bearing/hub for around £60

This tool seems to make front wheel bearings incredibly straight forward and can be done without needing to remove the knuckle from the car.

+ YouTube Video

I'll post updates on how this goes on my own attempt.

[Clan]

Originally Posted by T5R92011

This weekend I am likely going to be doing the front passenger wheel bearing on my S40 T5. As someone who can't stand letting other people work on my car, I thought I'd just buy the tools to do this myself.

After initially thinking I'd need a hydraulic press, I did a bit more research and found that the easiest way to do these is with a 'GEN2' Ford/Mazda/Volvo 78mm wheel bearing tool.

On these cars, the hub and the wheel bearing come as one unit that must be pressed into the steering knuckle. The steering knuckle can bend if you use a hydraulic press, so you are supposed to use this type of tool. The tool both extracts the old hub/bearing and also installs the new hub/bearing.

I've purchased the below tool on ebay for £72.00. Worth noting that the bigger P3 Volvo's of this era (XC60, S80,V70 etc) and larger Fords of the EUCD platform need the larger 82mm tool.


https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Wheel-Hub...4AAOSwVL1V~C9S

I have paired this with an SKF front wheel bearing/hub for around £60

This tool seems to make front wheel bearings incredibly straight forward and can be done without needing to remove the knuckle from the car.



I'll post updates on how this goes on my own attempt.

sometimes you need between 8 and 10 tons to press the bearing out , hopefully your tool can cope ! Yes you are supposed to use a press when you use the proper volvo tools .

[parallaxerr]

That looks like a good tool, I'll watch this thread with interest to see how you get on as I have the same "issue" with other people working on my car! Good luck with the job

[Tannaton]

I did the front wheel bearing on Mrs T's V50 a few months ago, I had previously bought a hydraulic press on e-bay for around £170.

Just as Clan said - the it got to over 8.5 tons before the old bearing cracked off and started to move. After that getting the old one out and the new one in was easier.

however, not having to remove the strut bottom clamp bolt would be a bonus as these sometimes sheer.

[IainG]

Hi
Just did the fronts on my V50 last week.
I used FAG bearings.
The motor factor hires out the Gen 2 kit. Very similar to the one you have but was a Laser one.
Worked great but did need a lot of force.
The 2 bearings I took off were FoMoCo on the nearside(the noisy one) and a FAG one on the offside.
I assume the FoMoCo was original and the FAG a replacement. I have had the car 10 years and not changed them before. So must have been done prior to my ownership.
I did have one problem!!
One of the new drive shaft bolts sheared when I did the 90 degree turn. Panic!!
Luckily 5 mm was sticking out from the drive shaft.
Removed shaft from hub and tried molegrips, just started breaking away. Wondering about removing driveshaft so I could drill it out.
Had a thought, Locktite. The bolts are loctited in so I tried a small blow lamp on the end of the shaft and the bolt just easily unscrewed. I assume it was the old set loctite and the new stuff binding up that caused it to shear. The new bolts were no where as good as the volvo ones, looked a lot weaker. I removed the other drive shaft bolt. I then ran a tap in the thread in the shaft to clean out the old hard loctite and then reused the original Volvo bolts with new Loctite. I know they should be changed but everywhere was shut by then.
Good luck
Iain

[T5R92011]

Well here's my cheapo tool, it's much heavier than I'd imagined...£72 is still a lot for a tool that you aren't going to use that often, though it isn't the £250 you can pay for the Laser version!

Will try it out over the weekend.

[T5R92011]

Ok, so I fitted the new bearing this weekend with 50% success using this tool (I will explain further down)

Things you will need that don't come with this kit:

- Moly grease (this must be used on the threads on the large center bolt, for every use) - £7 from eurocarparts (£5 if there is a sale on)
- 22mm socket.
- 30mm spanner.
- Decent length breaker bar.
- Driveshaft bolt - Volvo Part Number 30640878 (Ebay showed them as black XC90 bolts, but grey one arrived which matched what came off the car).
- New wheel bearing/Hub complete unit (I bought an SKF one, which came with a driveshaft bolt that DIDNT match the one that came off the car?? (see above note!)

Once you've gotten to the stage where the caliper, caliper bracket and brake disc and brake disc shield are removed (and out of the way!) just do the following:

- losen the tie rod nut, few medium taps with a hammer will pop the spindle out.
- Remove ball joint nut

To remove the bottom ball joint spindle from the steering knuckle, just smack the side of knuckle with a heavy hammer and it will break loose, you don't need a ball joint tool (besides, I have 3 ball joint tools and non of them fitted anyway!)



Push down on the control arm and you should be able to get the ball joint out of the knuckle. Use impact wrench to remove center driveshaft bolt (if no impact wrench, pop out the centre wheel cap and loosen while car is on the ground!)

From here you can then carefully tap the driveshaft out slightly, then pull the knuckle towards you to help the driveshaft come all the way out.

Assemble the tool by following the paper instructions (they aren't great).

Now comes the body building part... use your breaker bar to twist the central nut, while counter holding the rear with a 30mm spanner. Takes a fair bit of effort, took me about 2 minutes of work in total. Switched to a wrench near the end.

+ YouTube Video

Now...re-installation, this is where things didn't go to plan. This tool should allow you to re-install the bearing by using the second set of clamps that should clamp around the back of the bearing... however, the installation clamps in my kit just did not quite fit behind the bearing. I don't know whether this was a bearing problem, or a problem with the kit. I have a feeling my kit had the wrong installation clamps, because removal worked fine.

So, I had to remove the the rest of the hub and take it round the corner to F1 auto centers to press the new bearing in. Chap said it took 15 tonnes to push it in. Impressed with the kit's ability to remove the old bearing...

I have no doubt whatsoever that this kit CAN press the bearing in, I just could not get those installation clamps to fit around the new bearing (or even the old bearing that came out).

So my advice would be to perhaps RENT or buy the Laser version as you'd expect less inconsistencies with the included parts etc. To be honest, I think I could have ground some of the installation clamp surface to make it fit, but I shouldn't have needed to do that.

All in all however, I would say these tools DO make this job much much quicker in that you don't need to remove the hub. So I would definitely try this again (perhaps with a rented tool) when I do the other side wheel bearing in a few weeks!

Tips if you have to remove the hub

- Hit the diagonal edge of the steering kuckle repeatedly, to seperate it from the shock absorber. You will see the knuckle gradually edge it's way out from the base of the shock absorber.
- When re-installing, jam something into the 'jaws' of the shock absorber clamp to keep them apart enough to facilitate installation... You will still need to wack the underside of the knuckle to fully seat the shock absorber.

[FracturedButWhole]

Sorry to resurrect an old thread, but...
The reason why Gen2 tool did not work with aftermarket wheel bearing, is wheel stud heads sticking too much out of the flange surface. That makes it impossible to install "push-in" clamp fully and lock it in position.
Ask me how I know..?

Now... off to ebay to search for compatible ones. Unless someone here can recommend one? With no luck I may try to swap wheel studs, cumbersome, but doable.

Thank you in advance.

[Colinurquhart]

I'm looking at wheel bearing kits too but after reading this review its left me wondering. I've seen the same kit for around £57 but can't justify the laser price tag.

[T5R92011]

If I still have my old hub lying around, I will see how easily those studs come out.