The Stovebolt Site Forums The Parking Lot Big Bolts Front Axle Swap & Ball Bearing info

I have an early model 47 two ton dump. I have gotten it running driving good but the front king pins are shot.

I have found a running gear that has a good tight front axle. My plan was to bring it home and swap it with mine and put my hubs and bearings on the spindles of this new axle.

I got the new axle home and I guess it is a 1 1/2 ton front axle. Mine has taper bearings with barrel shaped rollers, this one has ball bearings. MY hub covers are dome shaped and retained by bolts around the outside, these hub covers are screw on caps.

Ball bearings are new to me. It looks to me like the inner races are made into the spindle. I can't see how to knock them out. I'd love to get rid of those races and use my bearings and hubs if they will fit.

I guess the other option would be to bolt up this axle and use it like it is. If I did that, I'd replace my king pins at a later date and reinstall my axle when I get that done.

I just need to know first if the races for these ball bearings can be removed and how that is done? Is there is any chance that these spindles will interchange with my bearings and hubs?

Finally if I use this axle with ball bearings, do they hold up to loads pretty good?

Any info on this subject would be greatly appreciated.

thanks!

Hy bigcopter, yes the inner race is removable, it may include the seal surface area. As far as standing up, obviously the screw in cap axle is a 1 1/2 ton axle, so it is lighter duty than your bolt on cap axle which is a 2 ton axle. The bearings will not interchange. The 1 1/2 ton axle made it this far with ball bearings, and as long as you don't severly overload it it should hold up just fine. It sounds like you have the original "barrel bearings" by New Departure, you should be aware that these bearings haven't been manufactured for decades, there may be tapered replacements available for your application, but don't mix and match bearing types. Don't be too nervous about using the 1 1/2 ton axle while you overhaul your 2 ton axle.

Thanks for the input, sounds like sound advice. I'll just clean and repack those bearings pop in my wheel cylinders and roll for a while.

I just got this old truck running but I sure miss it when its down. Regarding my wheel bearings, when I started bringing this truck back to life, all the wheel bearings were bad.

Since I figured they would be chore to find, I took them to "BDI", the bearing place in town.

The guy there said he hasn't seen bearings like that in years. He told me that he would try to cross the numbers but the new ones would probably be taper bearings. That is actually what I wanted. Since I was spending a fortune, I might as well upgrade it.

When my bearings came in, his supplier sent the original barrel roller type bearings. They were all the exact same numbers as I had given him. I guess they had a bunch of new old stock laying around.

Since then I went to CarQuest and they could have acutally ordered me modern replacements. Oh well, learn something new everyday.