what brand of wheel bearings?

[SatisTraction]

I am going to try and get some new inner and outer front bearings and seals tomorrow. are any brands better then the other?

[Apogee]

Timken, SKF, Koyo, BCA, Bower, etc are all good bearings. Just go to your local autoparts store and buy their "premium" option...it should be one of the ones listed above. I'm sure there are a couple others, but those are the first that came to mind.

SET 6 inner wheel bearing
SET 2 outer wheel bearing
National/Timken #8705S seal

Add some high quality, high temperature wheel bearing grease to your list and you should be good to go.

[CarlC]

From an old post. Probably too much info, but bearings are my work life.

Timken, SKF, and NSK are likely the most popular brands carried by the good resellers. The cups and cones from these manufacturers are interchangeable.

Years ago NTN purchased the Bower/BCA/Federal Mogul rolling element bearing manufacturing plants. If it says BCA Made in the USA, it's one of these. It will be fine.

There is some Chinese stuff out there but I would recommend staying away from them. If you go into Lowes or Pep Boys check out the trailer section. They will have them packaged for trailer repairs since they are the same parts. Most are made by Peer, a Chinese manufaturer/importer. In an emergency, broken down in BFE, they will work fine as a temporary measure.

You can also buy the bearings from an idustrial distributor such as Motion Industries, Kaman Industrial Technologies, and Applied Industrial Technologies. These companies will likely be selling only Timken products since they dominate the industral aftermarket for tapered roller bearings. These sizes are also very commonly used in industry. I would stay away from McMaster Carr for these parts since they have a much different inventory and purchasing system.

You will need the following part numbers:

Inner: LM67010 cup, LM67048 cone. May be listed as LM67010/910 for a cup and cone assembly. Also known as a Set #6 or A6. You will need two of each.

Outer: LM11910 cup, LM11949 cone. May be listed as LM11910/949 for a cup and cone assembly. Also known as a Set #2 or A2. You will need two of each.

You will also need two pcs. Federal Mogul P/N 8705S inner hub seals. Timken now owns National Seal Company so there's a good chance you may get a "Timken" seal.

Paul,

Your's were Koyo's, who is owned by Toyota. They are a pretty good part as well. They are likely #2 or #3 in the U.S. for automotive aftermarket inch series tapers. The anti-dumping regulations for Japan and Sweden (NSK/Koyo and SKF) keep the prices artificially high in the United States, to the benefit of Timken but at the cost of the higher consumer prices.

There are also some differences in heat treatment between some brands, but for our purposes any of the name brands (SKF, Timken, KOYO, NTN/BCA, NSK) will work fine unless you are going to run big racing slicks and run big-time speeds.

[SatisTraction]

nice info. it should be a sticky!!

[Project69]

I second timken.

[TPI Monte SS]

Timken or are BCAs are very good. Just make sure you get them with all metal parts. I've seen some sets come through with nylon races, and they'll cook under high-performance use.

[SatisTraction]

i ended up with federal mogul bearings and some "other" seal.

[CarlC]

The non-metalic cage is a nylon66/polyamide material. These have a safe operating maximum temperature that is 99% of the time higher than that of the lubricant. The lubricant fails first, creates excessive heat, and first component to visually fail is the cage.

The Set 2 and 6's from the majors are steel cages so no worries. But for ball bearing applications, I'll chose a properly spec'ed polyamide caged bearing every time.

Now, here's the differences in heat treatment, and how they MAY effect performance for us.

Timken carburizes their rings. The others typically do not. Why? Carburized rings will typically be tougher but have a slightly softer hardness. Modern through-hardened bearing steels from the major manufacturers are very good and quite durable. They will have a longer fatigue life. For our applications they are a good choice. For applications where impact resistance and toughness is a problem then carburizing could be better option.

Now, does Timken make their Set 2 and 6 parts in the US? Do they farm some of it to other manufacturers? Humm.

[TPI Monte SS]

The non-metalic cage is a nylon66/polyamide material. These have a safe operating maximum temperature that is 99% of the time higher than that of the lubricant. The lubricant fails first, creates excessive heat, and first component to visually fail is the cage.

Ah, that's how it goes! I always assumed it was the nylon that couldn't take the heat; I didn't realize it was the other way around.

[Apogee]

...Now, does Timken make their Set 2 and 6 parts in the US? Do they farm some of it to other manufacturers? Humm.

Most of the commodity type tapered rollers are being made elsewhere in the automotive size ranges. Timken is one of, if not the largest tapered roller bearing manufacturer in the world, and they own manufacturing facilities all over the world. One nice thing about Timken IMO is that they own/control their own steel supply, so from a consitency standpoint, should have better metallurgy than other manufacturers who are relying on outside steel suppliers.