Wheel bearing and housing

Today i ordered the spindle (2 of them) for the rear end of the Jetta... ordered from ID parts.com. I already have the Rear Wheel Bearing kit with hub... The locking nut that goes down over the spindle when all is installed is included. (#16, and #17 in the diagram below)

Rear Wheel Stub Axle - ID parts.com (#11 in the diagram)

Rear Brake set - ID parts.com

DOT4 Brake Fluid - ID parts.com

I decided to redo the brakes and rotors because when i was teaching at a high school recently the shop said they could do them for me.... They used NAPA parts (sorry napa) and they were complete junk. I also think that the squeaking of the brakes might have something to do with the rear bearing going bad. Anyway you slice it, i think it is relatively inexpensive insurance on the back end of the car. When i have it all torn apart i will make an assessment of the rear caliper pin sets. According to ID parts, these tend to rust and cause problems. They are pretty expensive to buy them and not have to use them.

I already have the rear axle bushing set for the car (#27 in the diagram), but just realized i probably should get the bolt set (#24 in the diagram) as well

2 December 2010

So for starters i am trying to figure out why the back end of my jetta keeps chewing up tires. the inner edge of the tires have this choppy look (picture to come later) ... i was a bit aggravated that there are no adjustments on the back end of the car for alignment issues and never really liked that design. I had an 1989 Honda prelude with double wishbone suspension and really loved it. it have every adjustment you could imagine. so i started with these axle bushings (#26 and #27 in diagram)... well when i first got them i was not sure where they went, and if you were not clear on that issue it was not clear where they needed to go. Finally i realized they are bushings that are about 3 inches in diameter that conned the rear suspension axle (#1 in diagram) to the bottom of the frame... kinda like a trailing arm in larger vehicles in the diagram. I had my mechanic try to replace them and the sizing according to him was 60 thousandths to big and he could not change it. In the mean time he destroyed the existing one and had to replace it with a piece of exhaust pipe and try to put the stuff back in... now i am driving around and the back end sounds like i have a can rattling around in the back. So now i have to get another axle, the spindles and the hub and bearing and rebuild one off the car and when it is ready, just a few sets of bolts on either side and i can remove and replace everything.

2 December 2010

So i decided that i wanted to create this blog to have a nice central location for everything involved with my 2002 VW Jetta TDi ... all to often i do alot of research for my parts and how to fix them on my car and i cannot remember what or where i found the instructions for my repair item. So i decided this is where i am gonna put everything involved with my car. I will include any and all pictures and even videos of how the stuff is done or where i found the parts