SevenSisters

Your getting good advice. My '91's ratttle was solved with the hose clamp trick. Here's the question though: Why after 10 years couldn't Subaru eliminate this minor gripe? It must drive their dealers crazy.

According to my manual (please check yours and the End Wrench article) on the rear, Subaru specs 1 to 1.5 mm for the gap. I measured the actual hub depth when inserting the hub and the tone wheel gap wound up on the high end of the spec. but works fine. This was probably due to the fact that the tone wheel was really rusty and a lot of crap came off when I brushed it to clean it up. As an aside, before I replaced the bearing and put on new pads and rotors, I was getting an ABS error code (check under the passenger seat for the display) for a bad sensor (about $150). After the job there were no codes. I'm thinking that the rusty brakes or bad bearing caused the sensor to heat up and thus screwed up the magnetic field and ABS the signal. The hub and wheel did seem to get noticably warm before the job. Good luck.

On my '91 AWD automatic there are two access covers in the trunk up near the rear seat back. Not sure if a change was made for you guys with new cars. Pull out the carpet and you should see them.

Alia176, Nice pictures of the job and your shop. I wish I would have thought of pictures while I was busting my knuckles. Only thing left to take a picture of is the screwed up inner race that caused all the noise. Hope attaching it to this message works. If not, someone tell me how to do it. OBW99, The hub tamer should let you push the axle out of the hub. Mine came out easily. Again, I used a Subaru bearing and did not repack it. Only time will tell if I did the right thing.

You might try one of the glass rain tratments (RainX, Castrol, etc.) to slick the glass up a little and cut the blade chatter.

I believe the 4WD vehicle speed sensor is mounted to the back end of the transmission extension case on the right side near or under the cross member.

Everyone on the board has been an inspiration and your postings on Legacy wheel bearing replacement (particularly the existence of detailed, new procedure directions at the Subaru End Wrench site) finally convinced me to I tackle the job my self. The left rear bearing on my ’91 AWD Legacy had been replaced by the dealer at about 60K, at least partially because of dragging brakes. About 40K miles later, it stated rumbling again and progressively got worse. I knew I was in trouble when I put on new tires and the noise continued. I continued to drive with the noise, but no apparent hub looseness, for about another 20K miles until enough was enough. After checking out repair costs at dealers and independents, as well as, Hub Tamer prices, I concluded I could buy the tools I needed, save money by buying internet parts, and at least break even with the dealer cost and still have the tools for when bearings go on the other side of the ‘ru or on another car. I bought a Hub Tamer from Tool Paradise for about $203 (when I called them their price was a little lower than listed on their web site and shipping was free) and the OE bearing, seals and axle nut from 1stSubaruparts.com. with no problems. I also replaced the brakes with non-Subaru rotors and pads locally purchased while I was at it. Another poster, alia176, commented that the forcing nut that came with his Hub Tamer was too tight. I encountered the same thing. Fortunately, I played around with the Hub Tamer parts and discovered this before busting the hub off. OTC acted like they never heard of this problem before but sent a replacement. (Poor QC) Lesson learned: if you buy a Hub Tamer or any other tool, make sure it works before you start the job. I pretty much followed all of the End Wrench directions using a slide hammer to remove the hub and then the Hub Tamer for the rest of the job. It appears that the bearing failed because the inner seals had deteriorated. They may not have been changed the first time the bearing was replaced by the dealer or the bearing may have failed due to the usual Subaru bearing failure reasons. I installed the new bearings like Subaru instructed. No new or additional grease. I’ll point out that I called a tapered bearing manufacturer’s tech service department (Koyo) and was told that tapered bearings should not be packed fully, only about 1/3 of the way to work properly. They claimed too much grease can lead to failure. If you do replace the grease, be careful you don’t add too much new grease. The tools described in the Subaru instructions are basically OTC Hub Tamer components, but with the addition a few key adapters. The “official” Subaru tools, allow you to apply pressure to only the outer race of the bearing during installation into the housing. Maybe I overlooked something, but I had to finagle the Hub Tamer adapters and wound up pressing the bearing into the housing the last ¼” or so by using the old outer race as a spacer to avoid putting pressure on the new bearing’s inner race. Of course, I had to grind the ends of the old outer race flat so it wouldn’t slip around. I wouldn’t use the directions that come with the Hub Tamer. They may only apply to the front wheel bearings or are just screwed up. The Subaru tools also have a slot cut into one of the adapters so you can force the hub into the bearing’s inner race and measure the correct seating depth at the same time. The Hub Tamer adapter does not. I pulled the hub in most of the way, removed the tools and measured the depth. Then re-applied the tools and carefully pulled the hub in the rest of the way based on the fact the forcing screw has 16 threads per inch (every full turn would move the hub in 1/16”). In hind site, I probably could have initially measured the original distance between the ABS tone wheel and sensor which are easily accessible, and with the Hub Tamer forcing screw still attached, pulled the hub into the bearing in one shot using this distance as a reference. The little ‘ru is running great now. Thanks for everyone else’s posts on this subject. I hope my experience helps the next person that attempts this job.