MGB Front Hub Trial Assembly

Explanatin of the parts and order of assembly of an MGB front hub.

[@JeffreyS.-mx1ex]

Great video! Thanks for posting it. Three comments. First comment. I found this out the hard way. Not sure if Andrew mentioned this, but the king pin has two holes for the cotter pin that are at 90 degrees to each other; one through the slot for the tab washer and another one at 90 degrees. This is very important because once the correct torque has been established it is possible one of the the merlons of the castle nut could be blocking one of the holes. By design if one hole is completely blocked the other will be completely open. This allows for minimal tweaks to the "over-torque" should a hole not line up with the crenels of the castle nut. If this is a rebuild there is a good chance the holes will be filled with grease, so poke about with a pipe cleaner. Second comment. Once the bearings are packed with grease, and assuming the swivel arm is on the car, it will be tricky sliding the shims and outer bearing into place. The whole hub will become a sticky mess. It is possible to drop a shim beside the spacer, and it may be hard to see, find and fish out. After several machinations of trying to slide these things in and out (as Andrew said, getting the right number of shims is trial and error) I found if I laid a length of clean, smooth, ridge wire into the slot of the king pin I could use it as a guide and slide the shims and bearing down the wire and on to the king pin. Third comment. Keep count of the number of shims you are using. Because of the trial and error process of finding the right shim thickness you will have to repeat the exercise several times (most likely). There is the possibility of losing a shim beside the spacer. So as you experiment with the right number of shims of various sizes record the number of shims used. For example, if four go in and you need to repeat the process you have to be able to account of the four. Some shims will be stuck to the spacer and some will be stuck to the bearing. Like the two holes in the king pin, I learned this the hard way. It was only by dumb luck that while crawling around on my shoulder, reenacting elements of my basic training, I saw the glint of a shim disappearing beside the spacer. Andrew, thanks for the video.

[@anthonyhfe6450]

Nice vid. I watched the other one too. Those look like the same bearings I ordered for my MGB ('72) Roadster. I will be changing my right-front hub in the near future. I'm reusing, or hoping to reuse, my old collar and castle nut. I have a used, but great condition, hub coming to me by this Friday. The reason I have to change this hub is the splines are flat and the wheel slips. This is an unsafe situation so make sure your splines are good in the wheel and on the hub. Thnx for the helpful vid 😊

[@TheThomasdahl]

Excellent video.. Full of ideas and time saving tricks. I would suggest not leaving off the brake disk and dust shield...

[@christianguillory7785]

Nice vidéo ! Do you know the torque for the top trunion nut ? I need for my front hub refurbishing... Tanks a lot . Christian

[@can-cruiser]

Thanks for posting and sharing

[@amulheirn]

No problem!

[@jimcrossland3575]

might find if you torque up too tight and 70 ft lbs is miles too much the wheel will not rotate, with this typ of bearing there has to be 10 thou slack to allow the bearing to expand as it will at speed

[@jimcrossland3575]

sorry meant 2 thou

[@cliffmaddox9420]

The method I learned years ago was to fit the bearings first without any grease, just lightly oiled. Select shims for a clearance that allows the hub to just spin without binding when torqued up fully, then dissemble grease bearing well, re-torque, check rotation, and done