removing bearing races

I do all races like that, pull out the tig machine, lay a bead on the race, let it cool and it almost falls out. Have done a couple with mig also but need to use anto spatter spray to avoid getting weld spatter where you don't want it
 
OK, I trying to figger this out, say on a axle you have the roller bearing in the housing....it's a press/snug fit, so to expand the metal on the bearing race, we heat it with the welder, it expands and by inference so does the housing....

when it cools the race obviously shrinks, so would he housing, no??

:surrender:
 
Has anyone tried the welding the bearing race trick to get it to drop out.

Nope. Just beat it out with a drift from the back side.

A brass drift, a 2lb. drill hammer and a game of "whack-a-mole" always seem to work fine.

I disagree. Whacking the shit out of them tears up the seating surface. Mine are marred up for that very reason and need to be refinished with sandpaper next time. I find it very tedious and time consuming to bang on these suckers for 2 hours.

I'm going to try welding a ring around the inside of the race next time. I have some spare rear bearing housings i'm going to practice on.
 
Has anyone tried the welding the bearing race trick to get it to drop out.

Nope. Just beat it out with a drift from the back side.

A brass drift, a 2lb. drill hammer and a game of "whack-a-mole" always seem to work fine.

I disagree. Whacking the shit out of them tears up the seating surface. Mine are marred up for that very reason and need to be refinished with sandpaper next time. I find it very tedious and time consuming to bang on these suckers for 2 hours.

I'm going to try welding a ring around the inside of the race next time. I have some spare rear bearing housings i'm going to practice on.

I've never had a problem using a brass drift. It should be soft enough to deform before it damages the steel. I don't think it took me two hours to do all eight bearings when I did the Vette several years ago.
 
I've used brass drifts and aluminum ones too. Never had an issue with tearing anything up. For the stuff that has a shaft thru it, a bearing splitter and a 20 ton press do pretty well.
 
I've used all the methods listed here and running the bead of weld around it works well and sometimes is the fastest way. Great when removing the shell from inside a housing.

Doug
 
use anto spatter spray to avoid getting weld spatter where you don't want it

I looked up anti spatter spray. I had never heard of it.

That's amazing. Thanks for the tip!

under $10 a can, this stuff actually works...(doesn't have to be Eastwood, the cheaper stuff is just as good) ... I needed it when I had a flux core welder, without the spray it was horrible...
 
Guys, anyone give me a fizzicks lesson here....WHY is this true??

dying to know....serious....short one/two sentence will do, I hope....

:hissyfit:
 
Guys, anyone give me a fizzicks lesson here....WHY is this true??

dying to know....serious....short one/two sentence will do, I hope....

:hissyfit:

A one sided weld bead always distorts stuff when it cools. The race OD is constrained by the bore of the part it is pressed into. The weld bead material melts into the race ID during the weld process, but the race stays the same size/thickness (despite the heat) because it's pressed into the bore. When the (steel) weld bead on the race ID starts to cool, it shrinks and pulls the race ID into a smaller ID. Because the race is a fixed thickness, when the race ID shrinks it pulls the OD inward also, shrinking its size to less than the bore size, and it pops out easily.

That's how it works in my mind.
 
heat soaks from the thin wall race into the thicker wall carrier.... the race shrinks while the carrier does not, the carrier actually grows.... the carrier then stays hot and "expanded" longer than the race....

hope this makes sense....
 
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