Hey all,

My wife's car (98 Mazda Protege) definitely has a couple of blown wheel bearings in the rear. My question - is this something I (should) be able to do myself? Is this a DIY type job or something best left to the professionals? Just looking for opinions.

Cheers.

<edit> Got out the Chilton manual for the wife's car... All it says for wheel bearings is "All Mazda vehicles covered by this book use sealed bearing assemblies. There are no provisions for repacking the bearings."

In my mind I'm assuming this might make things easier? Just replace the bearing assemblies? I'm just not sure how much work I have to do to GET to them though. FYI her car has drums on the back. </edit>

 

It sounds like the Mazda and Civic are similar jobs -- definitely DIY. If so, you would purchase new Hub Bearing Units. Here's how the Civic job is done:

 

RonJ comes through again!

Thanks for the info. Just need to see how much the parts are going to be now.

(admins - thanks for the move - wasn't sure if it should go in General Tech help since it wasn't Civic related)

 

Sorry, just have another related question so didn't want to start a new thread...

I finally got a chance to get the car up on a jack today - just wanted to try to test to make SURE it's the bearings before I go out and pay for the parts.

I didn't detect any play in the rear wheels when I tried to rock them in-out, up-down, or side-side... However, with the rear end lifted, there is some SERIOUS resistance when trying to spin the rear wheels... Neither wheel spins very freely, but the passenger side rear wheel will barely turn one full rotation when I spin it and stand back. There is also noise when I attempt to spin the tires - much worse on passenger rear than driver's side. Sounds like metal on metal, but more of a brushing sound and not so much a grinding sound.

When you drive the car, especially when you first start it up and are reversing out of the driveway, you hear what sounds like a creaking-type sound coming from the rear of the car. Very audible from outside of the car as well. I took it out to test for the bearings and sometimes get a big "CLUNK!" on sharp turns.

Is there anything else I'm not thinking of? Should I be checking for anything else?

 

You may want to inspect the rear brake pads and the brake self adjust mechanism, if they are drum brakes.

 

Thanks for the advice, RonJ... I'll have a look.

 

the clunk and/or creak noise could also be worn sway bar bushings, but that would be surprising on a 98

 

+1; sounds to me like the pads and drums if you have them.