Don't Jump To Conclussions

[husker boxster]

A cpl of wks ago I had my Cayman S up on the jack and found a slight wiggle with the left rear. That generally means a wheel bearing is fading away. Looked at a video on how to replace them and it was more than I wanted to do ("A man's gotta know his own limitations." - Clint Eastwood), so I made an appt with SLM, a local independent shop. Having negative camber in my wheels probably contributed to their demise.

SLM replaced both rear wheel bearings ($2K). But they wouldn't do the alignment due to a possible faulty Heim joint in the left rear toe arm and a leaky right rear shock. I picked up Sydney from SLM and got on the horn to Pelican Parts for a pair of rear shocks. Of course Sydney has PASM, which means a button changes the shocks from soft to firm. Soft is great on the street and firm is great on the track, but they're not great on the wallet - $1K. The Heim joints were better news. I have Tarett toe arms and they're much better than the factory issue toe arms. I put them on 10+ yrs ago and they've seen a lot of track miles. The good news was they sell the Heim joint separately, so I didn't have to replace the entire arm. Only cost $70 for 2. The shocks and Heim joints arrived mid-wk.

The shocks were the same story as the wheel bearings - not something I want to tackle, but the toe arms should be doable. I tried on Thu to replace the left one on the car with the tire on, but that didn't work. I tried again Sun by taking the tire off and removing the entire arm. Got it off and the new Heim joint in. Replaced the arm and put the tire back on. 1 down, 1 to go. I did the right side this morning in less than an hr. Had all the various tools I needed and had the procedure down. After doing some measuring, the left side was longer than the right, meaning it would have more toe. Took the left off again so I could loosen one of the bolts holding the turnbuckle tight. With the bolts loose, I could adjust the turnbuckle and pull the rear toe in. The left side is now equal to the right.

I should mention before removing the left tire and toe arm, I tried to wiggle the tire. It had the same wiggle as before the wheel bearing replacement. That meant it wasn't the wheel bearings causing the problem, prob the toe arm. So with the toe arm back on, along with the tire, I tried to wiggle the tire. No wiggle. Yay!

I wish I hadn't assumed I needed wheel bearings, but they had 93K hard miles on them, so they would go bad eventually. Just wish I didn't have to shell out $2K right now. Oh well, it's only money.

Update: I stopped at SLM today and they said I should have orederd shock mounts too as they tend to wear out. Made a quick call to Tarett and a pair are on their way via 2-day shipping. Hopefully SLM can get me in before the DE on the 10th.

Here's the offending toe arm with the Heim joint on the right. I changed Heims on both toe arms. These Taretts are much more robust than factory arms.



I wondered when I pulled the arm out if there really was an issue with the Heim joint. But the new one was much stiffer and swivelled less. The proof was in the fact the tire had no more wiggle.



I think I got the toe pretty close, as Sydney drove nice and straight to and from SLM.

[Marc_986]

Very sound advice here!

Reading between the lines, I am a bit shocked seeing $2k for a bearing replacement. That is about $150 in parts, so $1850 in labor

A good reminder why I am doing those things myself.

[husker boxster]

Before I farm out a job, I'll watch a video on how to do it and decide if I want to tackle it or not. While each individual job to get to the actual bearing replacement looked doable, collectively it looked like more work than I wanted to take on. Plus I have a DE date on the 10th I need to be ready for. So while it looks like their labor bill is extreme, there are multiple steps to get to the bearings that are labor intensive. Then take it X 2 because they have to put all the stuff back together.

I get your point about doing jobs yourself. That's how my Wheeler Dealer hobby works - I do the maint and my time is "free". But sometimes my time has value and I choose to farm out certain jobs. My Cayman is back at SLM to have them replace the rear shocks. Same scenario - it looked like more work than I wanted to take on and I'm time crunched.

While I don't begrudge them the price of the replacement, I could be a bit miffed at them not saying it was the toe arm that was the issue, not the wheel bearing. But I didn't come in saying I had a wiggle in the wheel and can you find out why, I said I needed wheel bearings. They asked why I felt that was the problem and I said the wheel had a wiggle. So they did what I asked them to do and found the real reason why.