Self aligning bearings help needed

Well just for the record I was actually right :) The races do just slip out (or should do). I've got 4 of these and had used them for my first trike build. That one was dismantled and all four bearings were stored in my 'useful' box. Admittedly they were in a cold and unheated workshop but I was surprised to find all four were pretty much siezed in the carriers just like yours. Took a steel bar to move them. Guess the fit of bearing to carrier has to be pretty precise to avoid slop and a tiny bit of rust between the surfaces formed which was enough to jam them solid. Took a bit of work with emery cloth to clean up enough to have them sliding nicely again. A coat of grease will hopefully keep them moving nicely now,
 
John

Good man very useful.
I think your workshop is a couple of steps above ' outside on a lawn under a tarpaulin ' ;)
You mention they just come out if you turned then through 90' ?
Is that in a particular orientation ? i.e vertical or horizontal with respect to the base ?

Paul
 
They're tipped till they are horizontal. If you look at the carrier you can see the two inner sides of the casting has 'slots' which the bearing needs to line up with. Even well seized my bearings came out without much of a fight.
All this is assuming yours are similar to mine but with a solid cast carrier there has to be a way to get the bearings in or the casting would have to be formed round the bearing I guess- and that's unlikely?
John
 
jonrev said:
They're tipped till they are horizontal. If you look at the carrier you can see the two inner sides of the casting has 'slots' which the bearing needs to line up with. Even well seized my bearings came out without much of a fight.
All this is assuming yours are similar to mine but with a solid cast carrier there has to be a way to get the bearings in or the casting would have to be formed round the bearing I guess- and that's unlikely?
John
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Yep I have the slots and have removed the bearing , tried wire wool and some emery paper however I have yet to make much difference to it ease of movement.
My efforts are tempered by only having 4 , not wanting to buy more !
Mine are these P0003 M17i am sure these are lightweight bearings , so maybe won't be strong enough anyway ?

Paul
 
Paul, please don't take offense, but you may be over thinking this.
Those bearings are not really meant to articulate freely, but are just made to swivel just enough to align a shaft that's not perfectly in plane.
If they were really loose in their housings, they would have too much play to do their job of holding a spinning shaft solidly in place.
Think of a wheel bearing - Wouldn't you want the bearing itself to be solidly locked in place, and not able to move around ?
 
undertoad said:
Paul, please don't take offense, but you may be over thinking this.
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No offense taken and you could be 100% correct , I am sure DannyC will be along shortly to confirm my mental state [ the usual fee Danny ? ]

Those bearings are not really meant to articulate freely, but are just made to swivel just enough to align a shaft that's not perfectly in plane.
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Let me plead my corner and any judgement made will NOT be binding this side of the pond :D
The car is meant to have the Samagaga diff fitted , DaleRider of this parish found a warning about not ' hammering ' the shaft shafts into the diff as it will damage it/render it useless.

So on the car as it stands the left half shaft can be inserted into it's bearings by hand [ ... a miracle I say .. a miracle ] however the right hand half shaft needs tapping in with a hammer so I cannot tell if I am ' hammering ' it into the diff or not ?
Try as I might I cannot get these 2 to line up as the bearings are almost impossible to move in the housings.
Now one way around this may be to use the half shaft from both sides putting it through one bearing and getting it to line up to enter the other , however you can't do that as it means removing the left hand inside bearing thus ruining their alignment......

I have already given up trying to get the diff in and am going 1 wheel drive , I will still have this problem then as I need to physically pack the bearings out [ thus altering their alignment ] to get 0 toe in/out between the rear wheels.

So where do I go from here ?

Paul
 
Have to say I disagree with undertoad re the bearing movement in the carrier. I know when I got mine the other year they all moved quite freely with a gentle interference fit. No play or slop at all but they were easy to align by hand. The shaft is assumed to be straight and therefore only needs to be supported by the bearing against sideways movement which it does fine. There should be no alignment issues once the bearings are mounted but the self alignment allows for any slight mounting point misalignment when they are set up. The only possible way they may be made to move once fitted is if the shaft is bent- big problems!

Paul I know these are a bit difficult to clean up but I used emery paper wound round a piece of wood dowel with a slot in the end to hold the emery. Mounted in my drill it took a bit of time and not easy to get to the concave surface but eventually it did the trick. My carriers have a grease nipple so they can be given a squirt at intervals to keep them free. I must find my grease gun and make sure I use it.
John
 
Hmmm -
Back to the age-old problem of getting more than 2 of those puppies in line on any one shaft .......
Can you buy a flexible coupling, or U-joint to fit your shaft?
If so, you could split one of the shafts, and make a stub shaft to fit the differential, then the flex coupling to the outer shaft, which would be supported by 2 of your famous overly stiff pillow blocks, and now not needing to be in perfect alignment with the diff.

Wow! That sounds like a great idea .......... I'm so excited, I may need to lie down for a while .......
In fact, if you used 2 u-joints, you could have the shafts way out of plane, like a car's driveshaft, and have them pointing in radically different directions.
Definitely going to lie down, now ....
 
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jonrev, you must have a better grade of pillow blocks than I usually buy :)
The ones I most often use are Chinese-made cast iron bearings, and the inner part is most definitely always pretty firm in the housing.
Now, I don't know how hard Paul's were to move, and they might be VERY tight, but I've never got any of mine to move freely, as you describe, with just finger pressure.
If I stick a bar or shaft in them, I can certainly move them around, but I wouldn't describe them as free moving.
They can move without a lot of difficulty, but are tight enough to stay where they're pointed.

That being said, the ones I buy are probably a very cheap grade, and I have no problem believing that better ones will move as you say, but my cheap ones don't act like that.
 
stormbird said:
So where do I go from here ?
Click to expand...
So, if you eliminate the diff, then you would have 2 separate shafts?
It shouldn't be hard to set the toe in, in that case - Each shaft will just have 2 bearings to line up, which should be easy-peasy.
The car would likely be more efficient, I'd think, with less drivetrain friction, so if you're just planning pavement use, maybe for the best.
 
From an enginering point of view, self aligning bearings/pillow blocks do work fine when mounted in pairs on 1 flat surface, and the power input or output has some leeway in alignment (belt or chain).

In this case, there ain't a flat surface in sight, and the diff doesn't have any leeway.
 
undertoad - like you I suspect my bearings are very cheap and maybe not meant to be that free , I certainly don't have any grease nipples in mine.
Grease nipples would imply they are meant to move freely AND greased to stay that way , unless the grease has a route into the bearing itself.

maddox - yes I am up against it from all sides , hence the decision to go 1WD , I figure that is preferable to 2WD where you can barely move the pedals. Even racing they were 1WD for many years and it is only some of the teams that are using 2WD.

Paul
 
stormbird said:
I still have:-
2 x disc caliper mounts to make and fit
2 x seat uprights to fit
1 x seat cross beam
1 x rear mech bracket
Click to expand...

So, that's a fair amount of work for the morning - When you get that done, what's left to do after lunch - Painting and upholstery?
 
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