Needle grease rear wheel bearings?

[Merian]

I fear that the general taxis of Vanagon owners to carry spare parts has gone awry in this instance..
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[tjet]

Spare bearing housing with new bearings & seals - good to go

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rusty lifted '87 locker syncro tintop

[MarkWard]

Had an owner come by with a noisy vibrating rear wheel bearing. I'm posting here not because I used a needle to to grease it, but to comment on how straightforward replacing or actually repacking the rear wheel bearings are.

Removed the tire and brake drum. Used an impact gun to remove the 45 mm axle nut. Removed the splined drive hub. I unbolted the slave cylinder and the two backing plate securing bolts at the bottom. With a hammer and drift, I was able to knock the backing plate free from the bearing housing and set it aside with the hand brake still connected. Unbolted the outer CV and removed the 4 bolts with a 22mm socket that retains the bearing housing to the trailing arm.

With the bearing housing off, set it in the press and quickly pressed out the stub axle. Removed the inner seal and circlip and pressed the inner bearing out of the hub. I then flipped the housing and pressed the outer bearing with the seal out of the hub. Cleaned all the parts and reassembled with new bearings and seals in the opposite order.

I had no indication that the inner bearing would be damaged pressing the stub axle out. I imagine you could clean and repack the bearings and reuse. There's nothing in the manual that indicates you can't reuse the bearings and based on my experience, I don't see why you couldn't. The bearings and housing are packed with new grease and seals. Should be good for another 100,000 miles. Figure on 2 -3 hours per side.

The time to consider this project is when you have the CV shafts out.
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1982 Vanagon Camper with ALH TDI.
1990 Vanagon Camper Syncro.
In Car https://youtu.be/5hbfdUJR88Q