Hello,
My 99 XJR has been squirming over some bumps and recently seems to squirm when going over road height differences/ camber changes between lanes on the highway.
She's also starting to shake the wheel when I start out in the morning, a symptom that seems to go away after a few minutes.
The shaking seems to be accompanied by a light clunking, something I'm familiar with when the front wheel bearings have gone south on my front wheel drive vehicles.
I went thru the front end (& rear end) a year ago, replacing sway bar links, shocks & upper mount plates, tie rod ends, and upper & lower ball joints so I don't think my troubles are with any of those parts.
I'm thinking one or both of the front wheel bearings may be developing a little slop even though I can't feel anything while shaking the wheel.
I've found several available parts, some quite expensive for what looks to be a pretty vanilla bearing.
What (US please) sources have people used for this part?
Any specific manufacturers recommended?
Thanks.

 

I got mine through Amazon, cheap enough but seem to be holding up fine. Well, unless you ramp the car into a ditch but that wasn't their fault lol. Just a Precision 510010 according to my order history. I did buy one at a local parts store, can't remember the make, but it went bad within 10k miles. Replaced with the Precision and no problems yet. Seemed counter-intuitive, buying one that's cheap, but they work for me so far.

 

Rockauto sells a bunch of different brands of those bearings as well.

Let us know how it goes, I've been having the exact same symptoms (squirm over camber changes/road imperfections, vibration first few minutes after driving) which I've attributed to the car's suspension geo, and tires flat-spotting respectively. Been getting slight rumbling at highway speeds sometimes too so maybe it's the bearings after all.

 

This guy sells complete OEM kits @ a fair rate w/ excellent customer service.

https://www.ebay.com/str/GOORGEN-PAL...p2047675.l2563

 

 

I've heard of the 12 point socket tool. Anyone know the size please?

ROb

 

2", 12-point socket is what people have used. Also, the tool can be had for far less than $100.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/JAGUAR-ABS-...tTf:rk:13:pf:0

Look around, and the keywords help. Rotor Nut socket returns a lot more hits than just "ABS Socket" and you get the cheaper listings as well. People know the ABS socket is expensive, so they list them as such. Sometimes it's a luck of the draw on the listings, but I found mind similarly priced and shipped from the UK last year. Only took a week or so to come in. However, a lot depends on your needs too - if you're stuck and can't wait, or if you still don't want to spend 60 versus 20, again, all valid points. Just wanted to point out for people that do want to purchase it, it's possible to get it around the 60ish dollar range as opposed to 100. And a whole lot less worrying about the socket jumping or skipping.

 

I'll second (or third, I lost count) the 2" socket tip. After reading a post about the ABS tool not being stout enough the remove the tone wheel I opted to use my harbor freight 2" socket. It's a tight fit and I found I needed to file a few burrs to make sure I could get good engagement on the tone wheel but with the help of my new 20v (harbor freight as well) impact the job went pretty smoothly. I couldn't get the nut off with a wrench (even with a 5' pipe on the ratchet handle). I had to use the impact to re-tighten the tone wheel as well, especially to get the locking pins into the nearest holes, this is one tough nut!
I'm staged to swap the knuckle assys this week as long as the snow doesn't stop me. This morning on my way in to work the old girl decided that one of the front calipers needs to be attended to as well. Hopefully it doesn't ruin my rotor, although the vibrations I felt pulling into the lot suggest that will be wishful thinking. I put the XJR away each winter as I think it would be mean to subject her to the salt we so liberally sprinkle on our roads up here and every winter she seems to let me know she's had enough! The last two were door handle malfunctions while the first snow of the year started piling up (always fun to roll the window down in a lake effect blizzard to use the outside handle to open the door), this year the brakes. I'm hopeful that I can at least make the knuckle swap and report on the bearing replacement before hibernation though...

 

I realized that I had two posts working on this subject, one was to ask if anyone knew if XK8 knuckle & hub assys would swap (they do, even though XK8 & XJ8 front suspensions are very different!). Then this post specific to the bearing source. I elected to get the bearings from amazon and had a shop press them into the spare knuckle assys lat week. I'm aiming for limited time in my driveway with the cat on jack stands for this job as the weather up here has been pretty cold & moist. Hopefully just swapping the knuckle assys (& front caliper) will mean I don't need to come up with more than a few hours of dry weather. I'll post about whether I experience any changes in behavior on the road but will say the new bearings are noticeably smoother just rotating by hand so perhaps just a small amount of play or wear is all it takes to call these bearings toast...

 

The last replacements I did, were the same - just had to swap the assembly out. The hardest part I had was getting leverage to tighten the ball joint nuts back in place without anything spinning. Otherwise though, it's a pretty quick swap to do the whole assembly on each side.