how would you know if a hub is bent?
 

hi guys

ive had a lil bump and the guy who did it is paying for the repair..

he's hit my back wheel - driver side rear

anyway the wheel is slightly more cammbered and is about half an inch away from the shocker as opposed to 1 inch on the other side.

rear trailing arm and shocker have been replaced

and its going for 4 wheel alignent and geometry next week

the hub appears to be straight from what we can see..

is their anyway to check it is ok?

i dont want the specialist to find it bent when doing the allignment and ask me to replace it as it will mean more delays. just want the car back on the road..

so will i have to wait and see at geomrety if its bent or can i check before hand?

cheers

The uprights themselves are difficult (although not impossible) to bend - although you would need a pretty high energy impact to do so. Unless you have a second "known good" hub to hand to take some comparative measurements off, about all you could do is visually inspect it for obvious signs of distortion/shearing/cracking. If a load of the rust has fallen off in one specific location that might be a clue.

However, as above if the corner had received a sufficient thwack to do the upright, you'd probably be replacing a lot more than just a strut and trailing arm. Bottom line is that any minor distortion, if there is any, should be "absorbed" by the adjustment in the suspension when the geometry is done, so if you can't see anything obvious, if it's there, it probably isn't big enough to worry about.

You might find, after a significant impact, that the bearing is a little the worse for wear so that would be something to try and check (although difficult to properly do so if it isn't on the car). Also risk of the hub itself being bent and/or the wheel itself being distorted - have you checked and ruled these out? Ditto the transverse links.

Incidentally, how did someone manage to hit your wheel with sufficient force to damage the suspension, without causing you a significant amount of bodywork damage? Lucky escape there by the sound of it!

hi split pin thanks for the answer.

i havnt checked the wheel out but the body work took the damge back door and rear arch.. wheel is slightly scraped as is back bumper.. the car has just come out of body shop, i dont think the shocker was bent just the trailing arm.. i just wanted to fit my new prodrive suspension lol

plus the inside ont he wheel had a red mark from where it has hit the shocker so just to be safe.

i just want the car running right now , i think i may have got off lucky.

so what your saying is the specialist doing the geometry will be the ebst guy to tell me if any other parts are bent?

visually the rest seem ok

Cheers

Hubs are easy to bend, Mates of mine have done 2 now.

The price of 2nd hand ones its just not worth not changing it IMHO. Especially given the price of a geometery setup.

Just spin it with a DTI fitted, see if it is bent...

dunx

P.S. Richard Henry is your best bet.

They dont tend to bend in that way, its the carrier that bends.

the geometry is being done by richard henry dunx

i'll see what he says when he gets it in on thursday

p.s. 172sport are you saying they can be bent even if you cant visually see it?

heres the damage that was done..

http://i256.photobucket.com/albums/h...2062010492.jpg

http://i256.photobucket.com/albums/h...2062010493.jpg

fink i was lucky the damage wasnt worse really.. door replaced and arch panel beated with a bit of filler, really cant tell it been damaged. happy with the bodywork repair, then again , i went to the best bodyshop in the area.

just want to get the car on the road now, really crap driving around in a 3 door lol

mate i hit a kerb (not hard) in the bad winter there and noticed my rear passenger wheel sat slightly out at the top,

it was the hub carrier that was slighty bent,

hope this helps

whats a hub carrier mate? and whats price on them?

cheers

It is possible for the upright to be deformed in a way you can't visually see, but the point I was making earlier is that if it's below the visually identifiable level, likelihood is that it will be/can be adjusted "out" when the geometry is done.

If the hub (i.e. the rotatey bit) is bent, then you should clearly be able to see it running out if you spin it round.

ahh right, cheers splitpin, makes sense, 'll get it back ona ramp tomorrow at my mates

cheers

Yeah pretty much, even side by side you cant see the difference.

IMHO you would have to have some sort of "fixture" to bolt the offending item in to get meaningful measurements.

They paid anywhere from 50 quid, granted that was for a classic tho.

yip as above mate ,the hub carrier is the large backing plate everything attaches to,

when i did mine it was 4mm out from top to bottom and made a big difference to the look of the wheel,made it camber out badly,

while i was wating on a new one from subaru, they adjusted and tried to fix it until the new hub/carrier arrived but it didnt make any visual difference.

You should measure the hub flange with a dial gauge indicator to make sure it's running true. Anything beyond about 0.05mm of runout and it should be replaced. We have checked many of these at the front after reports of juddering brakes, obviously no amount of new discs will sort it if the thing the disc attaches to is bent!

cheers getting iton the ramp at 1 so will have a look

The hub carrier is the part that the bearing presses into not the backing plate. :thumb:

If it hasnt bent the hub its transfered some shock down the shaft to your rear diff, its hit both sides of the arch and hit the alloy Id be very very surprised if it hasnt bent something or worse further in,
It may not show its self for a short time but you could end up with a damaged diff here also imo,
Id get it looked at by a proper garage, I understand your trying to save someone some money but if it starts going wrong in a month or 2 you will have no come back, and be left with a big bill.

I would be surprise if that has happened, the shafts are telescopic and can accommodate about 20mm of plunge per shaft.

thanks for the advice guys

turns out the shocker taken off my mates car was bent too lol so i put all 4 new shocks on (prodrive suspension) and with the new driver side rear shocker and trailing arm the wheel has gone back to straight position.

however now the passenger side which was'nt hit is more cambered than the side that was hit.. i think it just needs a geometry setup now and everything should be alright as when you look at the car it looks normal now.

drive fine too. i reckon geomrety should cure it. although i'm not writing off the hub yet.. just going to wait and see what the specialists say when doing the geometry and take it from there.

i trust richard henry to check it out properly. i feel more comfortable now as visually the car looks fine as opposed to having a really cambered wheel before..

and i will also be purchasing a hub spare just in case it does need doing. as like someone said earlier i'll regret it if something happens in a month or two.

cheers

also if anyone has any recommended geometry settings for fast road use, could they pm me them please

cheers

just got the car back from richard henry, said it was spot on and was impressed with the handling.

so it was just trailing arm and shocker.

althought i do have a hub now which i dont need lol ill save it just in case

also he mentioned he'd like to put a bit more negative camber on the front, just to perfect the handling but im at the limits on the standard top mounts. where can i get adjustable top mounts that will work with the standard struts?

cheerw