K Series Spigot Bearings - There must be a better way!

[Q Catcher]

Just replaced the spigot bearing on a 2001 VVC.  Getting the old one out was a Dremel and mash-it-out job.  The wall thickness on the sleeve was 0.62mm.  I forgot to measure the crank hole diameter.

We had two new bearing & sleeve sets: Redline and QED.  The Redline sleeve wall thickness was 0.60mm; the QED was 0.52mm measured and 0.53mm calculated (half of 22.06 - 21.00).  We weren't going to use the Redline one anyway, since, as it happens, the bearing was damaged in transit.

However, having had the QED bearing & sleeve in the freezer for two or three hours, and having had a heat gun on the flywheel for about 15 or 20 mins, it still took maybe a dozen blows with mallet & drift to get the new bearing in.  Looked OK when in, though, and the engine & box seem to have gone back together OK.

[revilla]

I recently bought two brank new crankshafts. Identical, identically packaged, from the same supplier. First one took a QED sleeve and bearing perfectly. Second one was like this:

 

 

The hole in the crank is at least 0.2mm oversize compared to the other one (I can slip a 0.2mm feeler blade down the side of the sleeve in situ.

 

I'll try a Caterham/Redline sleeve for fit and use the techniques mentioned above if still loose.

[simon_h]

That’s obviously annoying. As in it’s native use the hole is just a clearance then 0.2mm is of no concern. My standard rover crank when I built my engine up was f tight to the sleeve and bearing. It is what it is 

[Beagler]

At a Ford dealership we had a sliding hammer on a rod with a lip that gripped the back of the bearing. The slide hammer then pulled it out

[revilla]

Well more fun and games ...

With a QED sleeve that bearing was ridiculously loose. So I tried a Caterham-supplied sleeve which I know to be thicker ... but that was too thick!

I'd only knocked the bearing about a third of the way in and it was feeling far too tight, so I tried a gearbox input shaft in it and it wouldn't go through. The bearing was being crushed as it was knocked in. So before it went too far, I pulled it out with a slide hammer. The bearing still feels tighter on an input shaft than a new one so I think I'll have to diacard that as damaged and of course the sleeve was trashed by the time I got it out.

So I needed something between the sizes of the QED and Caterham sleeves. I thought about using bearing fit compound but it was so stupidly loose that I just imagine that it would eventually break down and come out. So I thought about shimming the hole in the crank with some thin stainless foil. I knew from measuring it with a feeler gauge that I needed about 0.1mm thickness, but looking online I couldn't buy small quantities in a range of thicknesses to find out what I needed.

And then I thought ... I'd got a really cheap and nasty set of feeler gauges in my toolbox, I could cut a strip from a feeler gauge blade. That would give me a range of sizes to try for peanuts. The strips were thin and flexible enough to be able to fit them into the hole in the crank but stiff enough to stay in place when inserting the sleeve.

A 0.1mm "shim" seems to have done the job perfectly. It feels about as tight as a QED sleeve usually is, I had to knock the brearing in reasonably firmly but it wasn't excessively tight and testing it with a gearbox input shaft, it slides in and turns nicely.

So there's a trick to remember.

If required, "shims" are available in packs of 32 assorted sizes for £4.49 here: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/FEELER-GAUGE-SET-METRIC-GUAGE-INCLUDES-32-BLADE-/353000214539?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&_trksid=p2349624.m46890.l49286&mkrid=710-127635-2958-0

 

[Jonathan Kay]

"With a QED sleeve that bearing was ridiculously loose. So I tried a Caterham-supplied sleeve which I know to be thicker ... but that was too thick!"

Goldilocks and the Three Bearings?

Jonathan