About to do the axle seals, swivel hubs and bearings. HELP!!!!!!

[Silver]

HTB grease for wheel bearings, moly grease for CVs, but check this, and not really sure what was meant to go into king pin bearings - read three manuals and still a bit uncertain. Used moly grease - LMM, but probably should have gone back on level on the Moly.

swivel hub bearing caps are thin sheet metal with a lip seal around the circumfrence. If you clean where they live, you will see the swivel has a couple of recesses machined in. With care and a tool that fits into those recesses it is possible to knock the swivel hub bearing cups out without damaging the caps. Otherwise $30 each from Nissan.

You might want to look for GU wheel bearing lock nut arrangement - it is a bit more civilised than the GQ. From my experience of a non genuine kit, the tab on the lock washer for the GQ wheel bearings aint to happy about the outer wheel bearing lock nut being torqued up to the specification in the manual, and I can't quite see the point of torquing to that setting. I get torquing the inner nut up and then backing it off, to make sure that all the bearing cups are seated properly.

The two issues I had were (1)getting the axle back into the diff (not the diff housing). Eventually I got a bit cranky and just wiggled it about and said rude words, and blow me down, in it went.

the second issue for me, which was easier than (1) was putting the circlip back onto the axle (the one that goes under the free wheeling hub). You may need to lever the axle out a bit to even see the circlip groove, but if everything is back in the right order, including the wheel bearing cups being set up against their stops, then all you are fighting is grease etc, and it will happen. Probably pretty easily, but don't bet on it :-)

Take care of the seal in the end of the diff housing when installing the axle and cv. If you google packing CV you'll find a couple of sites that help. All I did was put the wheel end of the axle into a vice, and squished the grease in with something very similar to a ruler on the side closest to me, while rotating the long end of the axle, until it squished out the other side of the CV.

If you are going to all that trouble, and there is anything dodgy about your brake rotors, consider replacing them now.

Swivel hub bearing pre load. I think the (dodgy) consensus is, if it worked with the shims and the old bearings, it will probably work with the new ones.

Finally, play very close attention to the scraper seal, backing seal (or whatever it is called) and associated metal work as you take it off, to make sure it goes back on in the right order, and make sure you put the new ones on before installing the swivel hub :-)

Keep track of what is happening as you undo the lock nut and then the bolt that sets the steering lock on each side - it is also one of the bolts that keeps the wiper seal in place. If you wind the bolt too far back in, you can allow the steering lock to increase to the point where you damage the CV.

If you clean the CV (I used kero and a brush, then kero in a kero gun with the compressor, and then water to wash the kero out, and then air to remove the water) and it feels clunky and yucky, that possibly only reflects that the CV is now dry. If it binds and carries on while lubed, or there are chip in the outside of the CV cup - you'll know when you see them, maybe get more advice. Pensioner mate over the road had rust and major clunks, and chips in the left hand side CV, and just chips in the RHS. Advice from mechanic was only LHS needed replacing. Make sure you get the right CVs, GU are bigger than GQ.