“Correct” Front Wheel Bearing Adjustment?

[OK-944]

There seem to be four general camps of opinion about what constitutes the “correct” amount of torque one should apply to the outer retaining nuts of our front wheel bearings. Some folks say to tighten (as always, in concert with rotating the hub) to a degree which allows one to move the large thrust washer with the blade of a screwdriver, without using any additional leverage from the inner wall of the hub.

A second set of folks go a bit further, so that the extra leverage is needed in order to move the thrust washer.

A third group goes further still…using large screwdriver, with its blade inserted into the retaining nut slot, to turn the nut as tightly as possible (again, while rotating the hub) - with no mention at all of the thrust washer. A good example of this “tightest” approach appears in the third episode of Van Svenson’s “How to install front wheel bearings” video set.

A fourth set of folks will tighten the nut using the “Van Svenson Method,” but then back off a bit from this before locking things down.

On my earlier ’85.5, I religiously stuck with the first camp…meaning that I could move the thrust washer with no applied additional leverage. Thing is, that car had always suffered from just a wee bit of the “70mph wobble syndrome.”

So…when it came time for me to tighten the newly installed front wheel bearings in my current car (‘87NA), I decided to join the second camp…tightening the retaining nut enough so that I’d need the extra leverage offered by the inner hub walls in order to slightly move the thrust washer. This car now tracks exceptionally smoothly at all speeds…with no hint of the aforementioned wobble. Is there a connection here? Yes, I believe so…but this comes more from my gut (and from my research) as I can claim no degree of actual expertise.

But now things get interesting: when I recently decided to re-check the bearings for tightness (thinking that this might be a good idea as I’d recently installed them) I noticed that a small amount of the red “high temperature” bearing grease immediately surrounding the bearings themselves had turned slightly brown - possibly indicating that things had gotten a bit too hot from my having (possibly) over-tightened the hub/bearing retaining nuts. So I backed these nuts off just a hair (still need the extra leverage to move the thrust washer, but its easier to do so) - assuming that the bearings, while possibly having over-heated, are still new enough to allow for such further adjustment.

At any rate…I’m very curious to gain some further insight, from folks on this forum, about what constitutes the “correct” method of assessing tightness of our front wheel bearings. Thanks!

[944 Ecology]

I use the "tighten it too snug, then back off about 10 degrees" method, never had a bearing failure in 15K track miles.

[9FF]

I also tighten them snug then back them off while turning the rotor. Same method I’ve used for over 30 years on 12 944’s. Don’t overfill with grease and drill a 1/16in hole in the center of the hub dust cap.