Motor Musings

Greetings fellow autohounds, and welcome to the second edition of Autos A-Z. This time I quite arbitrarily chose bearings as the subject of my meandering alphabetical ramblings.

That ‘arbitrarily’ part above is something of a lie. In addition to needing an auto part starting with the letter ‘B’ (this is the second edition of Autos A-Z, get it?), I just finished replacing a rear wheel bearing in my Wife’s 1998 Audi A4. This was not fun. Not fun at all.

Brakes are much more fun. Maybe I should have written about them instead. Oh well, I guess I’ll need something starting with ‘B’ for the next time around.

Where were we? Oh yes, bearings! You see, back in the old days, bearings were user-serviceable parts. They either had a zerk fitting built into the housing, or they could be disassembled and repacked with grease. They even sell great tools to help with this messy task. On most (all) cars today, this tool won’t help you at all, as the bearings are “sealed for life”.

They must mean the life of the bearing, not the life of the car; very rarely will all four wheel bearings last 150,000 miles. They will, however, last the life of the new-car warranty, that being the point.

At any rate, the Audi is much more pleasant to drive now, without that incessant howling from the left rear wheel.

To summarize:

Anything to add? Please let us know in the comments. We’re eager to hear from you.