Rear Hub Question

[lawyerbob]

The rear hubs appear that they are going to require some persuasion to get on. Is it normal for them to be very tight (requiring a mallet to tap them onto the axle)? If not - any suggestions?

I guess what I really worried about is that if they have to be tappend on - how hard are thye going to be to remove if/when I need to do that.

Thanks

[problemchild]

Make sure the splines on the axle are clean and free from burrs. If so, tapping on the disk is acceptable. Beating it on is Not .... at least this time of year. Twenty minutes before a session may be a different story

Tightness of the big nut is critical with those "Chinese" disks. The splines fall apart if the nut loosens at all .... although unlike a FV .... atleast the disk won't come off.

[lawyerbob]

Thanks Greg:

I won't go wailing on it, just wanted to make sure it was ok to persuade it some.

[sracing]

Bob, Snug is better than not. It will take a little persuasion to put them on.

Tighten up the axle nuts to 250+lbs at least. Then after your first session you will want to retighten them. (The metal shim compresses slightly.) A loose nut will destroy the spines on the rotor in just a couple laps. (German or Chinese )

Jim

[Bill Bonow]

Bob,

NEVER use the metal shim (OE VW or not). The potential for trouble will increase 10 fold from their use. I NEVER use them in FST and never had a properly torqued axle nut loosen or had issues with splines.

As for installation, some light "tapping" with a soft faced hammer may be needed, but not much more than that.

[problemchild]

German and Chinese hub parts may both go bad when the nut loosens. It has been decades since I had my last drum/disk/hub come loose. I don't think they had Chinese rotors then. The nut definitely needs to be tighter than with a quality FV drum.

[sracing]

Bob,

NEVER use the metal shim (OE VW or not). ....

I won't argue with sucess either way... However the design of the washer was for a torque to yield. The original washer was made of material that compressed enough to hold the torque. With no compression anywhere ANY slight wear would cause you to lose all torque. I don't doubt that you get enough axle stretch (torque to yield) to keep it tight, but that was not probably the original intent of the VW engineers. Certainly the new washer manufacturers in Mex, Brazil, and China didn't consider this much <g>. That is why I recommend a retighten after its first session. By the way typical rear end diffs, on street cars that use this torqueing method using a compression washer exactly the same way.

But whatever works.... I have also not had any disk or drum spline failures in many years. I am aware of about 3 in FST in the last 5 years. But those were simply guys that torqued them down to the standard VW specs and no later checks due to inexperience.

[Bill Bonow]

Jim,

I torque them to standard VW specs with our FST custom Torquemeister and they don't come loose. Maybe if I used a Chinese torque wrench, they would fall off

The shim is actually a revision part from VW to replace the original oil seal back up "drain". The original drain was hardend sheet steel as was the original revision shim and they compressed very little (if at all). In an FV with drum brakes, the shim must be used for proper spacing. Our rotors don't need the spacer. Most of the shims that come in the current aftermarket seal kits are soft and compress a lot. Back in my FV days, I would only use an original (hard) VW shim.

[Doug FST 5]

I also discard the shim and tighten to 250+ with a big torque wrench. No issues with loosening disks in FST or drums in FV. Similar to other posters, we've seen too many issues with the shim and no advantage to installing it.

Doug FST 5

[lawyerbob]

Jim, Bill and Doug - you realize you jut took this over my head right?

Thanks for the advice guys - I think I know what I need to do now.

[rickjohnson356]

thanks to all the contributions for more experienced members-- us FST newbies wouldn't have a clue with out the (elder) guys telling us what works.

[sracing]

One thing to keep in mind, is that all advice is worth just about exactly what you pay for it. (and if you keep calling us "elder" it will be worth less than that.

Jim