Front Wheel Bearing -- DIY Walkthrough

That is actually not true. HA590315 and HA590118 are both front bearings (HA590119 is the rear one). I don't remember where I read it but the HA590118 is the older design. HA590315 has less material on the hub and more on the flange. On my 2008 (2.5i though) the OEM one looked exactly like the HA590315.

 

I just looked on rockauto.com and for GT (05 and 08) they only list HA590315 for front and HA590119 for rear. I would go with HA590315. You can always take the front wheel and rotor off and check what you have there now...

 

Yes, that's the one I grabbed back in December. Fit perfectly.

 

FWIW, to those in the rust belt(i.e. Central PA) who never had your front caliper bracket bolts off before...good luck!!!

 

First time my Ingersol & Rand impact wouldn't break something loose for me. I had taken other bracket bolts off before on other Subarus in my family and although they were always tough, I always got them loose. It took me about an hour of messing with the bottom bolt but it finally broke free. The top one...no way. Messed with it on and off for hours. Plenty of PB blaster was used. I did NOT want to snap it off so a breaker bar was out of the question. Finally, after heating it up with MAPP gas for 5 minutes, it came out in like 3 seconds! I used propane earlier in the day but that was worthless. The threads on the bolts were crazy. Practically solid rust. You can barely make out threads were there at some point!!! And by the looks of it, the PB Blaster didn't get anywhere near where it would have helped. The bolts were pretty much fused inside the bracket.

 

Fun.

 

I gotta do front brakes and rotors on it this week and this time on the other side I didn't take off yet, I'm cooking it right from the get-go! At least I know the other side will come apart easily

Edited March 8, 2016 by Shik

Humm another good reason to remove the brackets and paint them every few years.

 

My brackets come right off. I paint the brakes every year or so.

 

Hope you use anti seize compound.

Front,

 

[ame=http://www.amazon.com/Timken-HA590315-Wheel-Bearing-Assembly/dp/B0031HRJ5S/ref=au_as_r?_encoding=UTF8&Make=Subaru%7C13&Model=Legacy%7C64&Year=2005%7C2005&ie=UTF8&n=15684181&newVehicle=1&s=automotive&vehicleId=1&vehicleType=automotive]Amazon.com: Timken HA590315 Wheel Bearing and Hub Assembly: Automotive[/ame]

 

 

rear,

[ame=http://www.amazon.com/Moog-512293-Wheel-Bearing-Assembly/dp/B000JZEYC6/ref=sr_1_2?s=automotive&ie=UTF8&qid=1457525090&vehicle=2005-13-64-------------0&sr=1-2&ymm=2005%3Asubaru%3Alegacy&keywords=moog+hub+subaru+legacy+2005]Amazon.com: Moog 512293 Wheel Bearing and Hub Assembly: Automotive[/ame]

 

 

I have Moog in the rear of my wagon, left rear at 153,877 miles, Mar 31 2012, right rear at 159,190 miles Sept 15 2012.

 

Fronts were done, left at 140,515 miles Feb 5 2011, right at 155,945 miles Jun 27 2012, Fronts are OEM.

Edited March 17, 2016 by Max Capacity
Added pictures of items

 

Hope you use anti seize compound.

 

I'd hope even the beginner of beginners would use anti-seize after that fiasco

 

Here is the infamous said bolt, along with it's OEM replacement:

 

 

Anyone doing front wheel bearings(or rotors for that matter), should invest in some new bolts ahead of time!

Edited March 15, 2016 by Shik

Picture link is broken. Use the URL feature in Edit>Go Advanced>Paperclip to load them to the site, like I did in Max's post #353 above.

 

Bonus - They won't use up your photo access bandwith.

Edited March 15, 2016 by SBT

Does a new front hub/bearing from the dealer parts dept. include a new axle nut and 4 new mounting bolts? (The FSM shows the nut and the 4 bolts as being non-reusable items)

I don't reuse the axle nut, which is not included in the HBA kit, but I did reuse, on both ends (Front and Rear), the HBA attachment bolts.

...but I did reuse, on both ends (Front and Rear), the HBA attachment bolts.

 

That sounds like a reasonable thing to do. It is puzzling that Subaru considers these bolts to be for one time use only. They are not highly stressed (like, for example, the crank pulley bolt), from what I can see.

That is actually not true. HA590315 and HA590118 are both front bearings (HA590119 is the rear one). I don't remember where I read it but the HA590118 is the older design. HA590315 has less material on the hub and more on the flange. On my 2008 (2.5i though) the OEM one looked exactly like the HA590315.

 

I just looked on rockauto.com and for GT (05 and 08) they only list HA590315 for front and HA590119 for rear. I would go with HA590315. You can always take the front wheel and rotor off and check what you have there now...

 

Hmmm. I just downloaded the Timken bearing catalog (last updated 2010) from here:

http://www.timken.com/en-us/products/Pages/Catalogs.aspx

 

It shows HA590118 as being the correct front hub/bearing for 2005-2008 Legacy and Outback.

 

It shows HA590119 as being the correct rear hub/bearing for 2005-2009 Legacy and Outback.

 

It shows HA590315 as being the correct front hub/bearing for 2008-2009 Impreza.

 

The catalog does not break out different part numbers for turbo and non-turbo models.

Edited March 27, 2016 by outahere

So I went to Timkens online storefront and found this information:

 

"This part number [ HA590118] has been superseded by part number: HA590315"

 

http://www.timkenstore.com/ptp/do/productDetail?partNum=HA590118&srcCode=&doNewSearch=true&referencePage=SearchSuggest&navbartype=Store&selectedcountry=USA&viewstore=true&selectedstore=Timken&bflag=false&selectedlanguage=English

Thanks for the write ups everyone, definitely think I'm gonna need to replace the front passenger side bearing soon. Been hearing a noise coming from there that gets louder as I drive faster and seems to stop as I brake.

Thanks for the write ups everyone, definitely think I'm gonna need to replace the front passenger side bearing soon. Been hearing a noise coming from there that gets louder as I drive faster and seems to stop as I brake.

 

 

Just another tip to reinforce your feelings...if you are thinking it's the passenger front, turning left at speed will exacerbate the sound as more load will be put on the right side over the suspected bad bearing. Good luck!

Worth it to have this the toolkit. I use the chisels to work in between the knuckle and the Hub mounting flange. If you look at the knuckle there is space in between the dust shield and knuckle to get the chisels in and wedge the hub out from the knuckle. I Did it wrong and went between the hub mounting flange and the dust shield. I damaged the shield a little but i was also have to get a crowbar in there to pry the hub off the rest of the way.

Hello, new to the forum and loved reading this thread. If someone out there can answer this for me, I would appreciate it.

 

I want to replace the front bearings on a 1998 Subaru Legacy Outback 2.5L

Is there any place to buy the hub/bearing assembly like in the first post? It seems online you can only do that for newer models. I feel like I have searched everywhere and can only find the bearing. Was hoping to avoid taking parts to a machine shop. I thought I saw Timken for sale on RockAuto, but now they seem to only sell the bearing. Any help would be awesome.

 

Thanks.

The 2nd Gens do not have an HBA as we know it on the 4th and subsequent generation Legacys.

 

On the 2nd Gens, you need to press the splined hub out of the bearing, then press the bearing out of hub assembly. Replacing the bearing is the reverse process. Make sure that you purchase new clips and inner and outer seals to go with it.

 

More information is found in our 2nd Generation Forums found here

Thank you SBT for the info, and a link to the 2nd Gen forum. Appreciate the help!

Great thread. Gonna bump it cuz it got me through this rust-filled-hell-job that I did this weekend.

 

First wheel bearing/hub assembly job for me and these were my takeaways:

 

1. Rent/buy a hub puller - don't even bother without one if you've even driven your car in the rain

2. Soaking the bolts etc with PB Blaster the week before definitely helps

3. Originally ordering the correct assembly helps and reduces seat time on a bicycle when the rear hub assembly you ordered obviously doesn't fit in the front (facepalm)

4. Whiskey helps a lot with the frustration, rust and general anger towards 150k miles of seized shit.

 

 

Thanks lgt forum for all the useful tips in this thread!

Job was going smoothly until the last hub assembly bolt. Couldn't access it easily because the axle got cockeyed. How can I move the axle freely? And how can I prevent it from coming out misaligned? All I need to do now is knock off the assembly but I want to get the axle straightened up first. Any help would be great, thanks!

For anyone without air tools trying this, using a floor jack as a lever under the bottom of the breaker bar is a big help.

 

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

Sorry to be so late, did you get this done ?

 

The axle is flexable and should not be a problem. It has some movement in/out just push it out/back into the hub.

 

 

See pictures in post #28.

Edited November 22, 2016 by Max Capacity

Sorry to be so late, did you get this done ?

 

The axle is flexable and should not be a problem. It has some movement in/out just push it out/back into the hub.

 

 

See pictures in post #28.

Yeah I was able to get it done, I think I just have to be more careful with the axle when I'm moving the wheel to access the bolts on the backside of the knuckle. Was able to get the new axle nut on so all is good.

 

Also snapped off the bottom caliper bracket bolt, was seized within the knuckle opposed to the bracket. Penetrating oil and patience is key on this project.

 

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

Also snapped off the bottom caliper bracket bolt, was seized within the knuckle opposed to the bracket. Penetrating oil and patience is key on this project.

 

You should have read post #351 before snapping that bolt off. Depending on where the car spent its winters, no amount of penetrating oil will touch some of those caliper bracket bolts(see pics of rusted bolt on previous page).

 

Map gas is the key on this project.

 

Anyone planning on doing a front wheel bearing(or just replacing the front rotors for that matter), should get map gas and heat those brackets up straight away. I don't even bother trying anymore without it.

FWIW, from early on with my 05 and 09, yearly I paint the calipers and grease the slide pins and anti-seize all the bolts.

 

I hope you all use anti-seize on the nuts and bolts you install.

Thanks - some useful info...

 

 

All sorted - no humming at 40 mph now

This thread was pretty useful for me. Just got my bad hub and bearing off this afternoon. The only problem I now have is that I rounded out all the bolts and no dealerships in the area have them in stock.

 

I had to cut two off and used a lot of hammering, rust penetrant, and map gas. Ohio rust is a real pain!

 

So my advice is to buy new bolts too!

 

I need 4 of these ASAP now. http://parts.subaru.com/p/Subaru__/FLANGE-BOLT/49301273/901000238.html

Good tip at around the 1:00 mark if you have trouble removing the old wheel bearing.. Never thought about this. Basically thread the 4 bolts back in a little, put an impact socket on each of the bolts, and then smack it with a hammer. Do a star pattern (or just side to side like he does) like you would when tightening your lug nuts down to ensure the old bearing gets pushed out evenly.

 

Edited February 7, 2017 by apexi