Alright so I creep around this forum alot and have found lots of great info from members on here so I thought it would be right to give back to the community a little bit. This is my first write up so go easy on me... hopefully this helps someone save alittle money and replace thier wheel bearing hub assembly themselves! This may be the same for 2001-2003 as well but I'm not 100%.
Its fairly simple and straight forward If you can do brakes you can do this!!!

So first things first. You need to identify which wheel bearing is bad. I had some pretty worn out tires on my car and thought the loud vibration/rumble was because of that. After replacing my worn tires the rumble was still there. I couldnt think of what else would be causing such a noise considering my alignment was good. So I asked around and talked to a few mechanics and friends asking for thier input on what they thought it could be. Everyone suggested wheel bearings.

I had to determine which bearing was bad. I simply raised the car off the ground and and listened closely to each wheel as I spun it. Some recommend a sethescope. In my experience it is easier to hear when you get the wheel going faster rather than slow.
Listen for a grinding,friction, or just an un-smooth sound. Its a different sound than you rotors and pads touching alittle. (kinda hard to explain but you should hear a noticable differnce between a good and bad bearing.)

Ok on to the pictures and procedure, (sorry for the iphone pics)
First remove the wheel...

Next you will need to remove the caliper. It is only 2 bolts they are 19mm.
also unclip the "brake pad warning" sensor so you can get the caliper out of your way. Alot of guys set the caliper on a bucket or zip tie it up to the coil spring. Just get it out of your way and make sure it cant fall or drop so you dont damage your brake line or anything else for that matter.

Remove the rotor. You may need to gently knock it loose.


Now if you turn the wheel to the extreme left or right so you can see behind it you will see 4 bolts holding the whole hub assembly to the "spindle?" (Not sure the correct term or not.) They are 17mm Bolts. Remove them.

After removing them you will notice the hub assembly is stuck on there pretty well. Alot of times these seize on to the spindle and are quite difficult to remove. This is probally the most difficult and time consuming part.

Unclip the abs sensor.

What I found works well is a little mini sledge and a punch or a pry bar. Give the wheel hub some pretty good whacks all around it. Dont worry about damaging the hub its no good anymore anyway. Now you will need to work around the back of the spindle.

I couldnt get a good picture on the car but this is the area you will need to hit with the punch on the old wheel bearing.


Take your Punch and work it around hitting the edge of the wheel hub from the back of the spindle. You will probally need to do this a few times and quite hard.

Once the old hub and Brake dust shield has been removed you will need to get all the corrosion and dirt out of the hole in the spindle where the hub slides into. A wire brush works great for this.


Once the area is clean put the dust shield on the spindle and try to fit the hub into the spindle. Make sure it goes in fairly straight. If it is hard to get in you need to clean your spindle somemore. (The abs sensor points toward the rear of the vehicle)
Insert the bolts and tighten down in a diaganal pattern little by little similar to how you would mount a tire.

Make sure everything is tight plug your sensors back in, attach the rotor and reattach the caliper. Re-install the wheel.

Thats pretty much it! Hopefully this was helpful and clear. If you have any questions let me know or feel free to add any suggestions or comments! Thanks!

 

Thank you. Awesome DIY.

 

Nice writeup! I've done wheel bearings & hubs on my previous car and it's not that bad of a job.

 

Thanks for the great info and pics - nice job. If you have a lift it certainly looks like a pretty simple job (assuming the bolts and parts aren't rusted and frozen on) . I can't believe how much Lexus charges to so this relatively (for them) simple repair.

 

As others have said, thanks for the write-up. I might add that you can borrow a slide-hammer puller from most auto part stores to pull the hub out of the steering knuckle. Also, a couple of 12 mm bolts screw into the threaded brake rotor holes and "push" the rotor loose without any hammering. Sometimes the rotors are easy and sometimes the bolts are really, really needed.

 

very nice write up and thank you for the DIY

 

Great tips, thanks!

 

Nice write up ill be changing my fronts soon already did rears at local shop,good to see you don't need special tool for fronts.

 

I just did both front wheel bearings on my 05' LS430 yesterday, along with a brake job. Only the left front was bad, but I figured the right front wasn't far behind... I wanted to add an alternative to the procedure above, since I tried doing it this way on the first hub, but it was a PITA...

I loosend all four hub bolts, left them in and backed them off until there was about 1/8" or 3/16" space between the bolt and the knuckle. It took only one medium blow from a small 3lb hand sledge, on one of the bolt heads to dislodge the old hub... Using the sledge & punch method above was much more difficult.

The OP states that the ABS / Speed sensor connector points toward the rear of the vehicle. The is true only on the passenger side / right front. The left front points towards the left front. In other words, for both hubs, when facing the knuckle, the speed sensor connector is around 10 o'clock... (more like 10:30 if you want to get picky...)

Also, the torque specification for the two caliper bolts is 81 ft. lbs.. The torque spec for the four wheel hub bolts is 51 ft. lbs... Lexus warns not to overtighten the two caliper bolts since both the knuckle and caliper are made of aluminum. Lexus also recommends using two new caliper bolts any time the existing bolts are removed... (The torque spec for the rear caliper bolts is 58 ft. lbs.).

I must say that replacing these was very easy, as long as you have the right tools...

Jim

 

I was just about to ask if replacing both the bearings is the way to go but Jim covered that.

Great write-up, definitely deserves a place in the sticky DIY/FAQ thread!

 

nice write up...can you tell us where you bought the parts from? I imagine you shopped around, just wondering what the hubs and rotors go for.

 

I bought the front hub/bearing assemblies from Sewell Lexus. You need to establish an account with them before you'll be able to view their best pricing with our Club Lexus discount. The hub assemblies go for $417.38 retail. Sewell sells them to us for $256.69 each.

I didn't need to replace my front rotors, they spec'd out at 29.76mm. The acceptable range is 30.00mm to a minimum of 28.00mm. If you do need to buy them, they retail for $162.08 each but Sewell has them for $99.68 each for CL members...

I've been consistently happy with the service I've gotten from Sewell over the years. I check other sources before purchasing...

Just for future reference, the rear rotors thickness range is 16.0mm to a minimum of 14.5mm, the rear caliper bolts are to be torqued to 58 ft lbs (instead of 81 ft lbs in the front), and the four rear hub / bearings bolts are to be torqued to 48 ft lbs (opposed to 51 ft lbs for the front)....

Jim

 

Very nice write up and agree on Sewell service as well .

 

I noticed that the ABS sensor is already on the new hub assembly. Does this come with the hub sub assembly part you got from Sewell or is that separate? They list a separate skid control sensor for another $183.

 

what caused your bearings to go bad? and how did you realize it?