they don't make'm like they used to.

meatwagon wrote:
Just replaced both front wheel bearings on my truck. They only lasted 8yrs. and 122,000 miles. I traded in my 85 3/4 ton chevy in 02 with 160,000 after 17 yrs. and allot of 4 wheeling with no front end work. hopefully the rest of the truck fairs better. I guess they all have their weak points.

No worries. You will soon be replacing the sector shaft, ATF hoses, oil cooler hoses and shocks.

Never mind about the shocks. You have already replaced those if your truck has over 10K on it. :B

I thought for sure you were going to be a Ram owner.

I wouldn't give you 10¢ for a GM IFS truck.

.........Oh wait, my family owns/has owned a whole fleet (7) of them. Never mind.

I guess I would give you 10¢ for one.

I hate unit bearings! One reason I bought a pre-97 Dakota is that it still uses the old style wheel bearing setup!

Engineer9860 wrote:
I wouldn't give you 10¢ for a GM IFS truck.

.........Oh wait, my family owns/has owned a whole fleet (7) of them. Never mind.

I guess I would give you 10¢ for one.

I wouldn't own an IFS truck unless it was a 2WD.

My 92 F-350 had its original bearings & hubs when I sold it. It had 366,000 miles!

Sealed unit bearing hubs, non-greaseable ball joints, u-joints and tie rod ends, central axle disconnects, vacuum auto hubs, soleniod shifted transfer cases, etc are what's wrong with most new trucks these days that keep them at the dealer replacing stuff that should last 2 or 3 times longer with normal maintenence. But that's the problem too, nobody wants to maintain anything. Use it up and toss it and throw another cr#ppy one in to replace it.

meatwagon wrote:
Just replaced both front wheel bearings on my truck. They only lasted 8yrs. and 122,000 miles. I traded in my 85 3/4 ton chevy in 02 with 160,000 after 17 yrs. and allot of 4 wheeling with no front end work. hopefully the rest of the truck fairs better. I guess they all have their weak points.

Did you go through water deep enough to go over your hubs, then not re-grease the front wheel bearings ?

I am guessing that they are unit bearings and it's not possible to grease them just like it is on Ford and Dodge 4x4's?. Not just limited to Chevy : (

Lessmore wrote:

Did you go through water deep enough to go over your hubs, then not re-grease the front wheel bearings ?

Can you post a link to the procedure for greasing unit bearings? I am very interested in doing this so I don't experience the same failure as the OP.;)

It's not a typical service procedure and likely not recommended by any sealed bearing manufacturer, but I have stuck a hypodermic needle and surringe of grease into the rubber/plastic seal of smaller sealed bearings and shot some grease into them that way, on bicycles and skateboards. The metal sides of the automotive sealed bearings would likely prevent that though.

Non-zirk-fitted axle and driveline u-joints can be taken apart and the needle bearings and cups cleaned and greased. I've done that before. However, u-joints are so cheap that most of the times I've had them out, I've replaced them with new, aftermarket ones, already drilled, tapped and fitted with grease zirks, so I can easily maintain them in future, without hassling with pressing the cups in/out of the yokes.

Greaseable zirc fitted ball joints are no more expensive than non-greaseable ones, typically, so it's dumb to go through the job of replacing a set of ball joints and put in another set of new, non-serviceable ones. Same thing with tie rod ends.