Re: Green bearings pro and con

For many, many years an almost infinite number of cars and light trucks have used deep-groove ball bearings as rear axle bearings in live rear axles.

One Peugeot 504 station wagon I had came to me with a rebuilt differential. It might have had, somewhere around 450,000kms (280,000 miles) the wheel bearings replaced at that time too. It did a further 750,000+kms (500,000 miles) on those wheel bearings and was still going when it 'retired' due to other issues. For the majority of that time it carried quite heavy loads almost everywhere it went and towed a heavily-laden trailer much of the way as well.

I have never had any concerns with deep-groove ball bearings as rear axle bearings in millions of miles in Peugeots. And, trust me, I fling them about, they corner quite hard in my use.

Today almost all, if not all, Japanese light trucks and vans have them. They don't suffer.

That said, I am a bit of a fan of the original setup on the Chrysler rear ends. To my way of thinking it's a bit of good engineering to spread the load in cornering. For those who have not looked at it closely, in cornering the load on the outside wheel is increased, so the outside bearing takes that load. But by transferring the actual cornering load, the g-forces developed by the tyres, to the now-lightly-laden inside wheel bearing the load is thus spread between the two.

Now, looking at these new Green bearings with the snap rings, it seems to me that they will obviate the problem of loading the bearing against the opposite axle via the spacer in the middle of the differential. But do they give a slight track width increase? In other words, will the need for a snap ring cause the axle to stand a little further proud of the housing?

Ray