Hi, sorry for posting up in the General Chat area first, I'm used to that from other forums. I'm into Jeeps and have membership in the International Full Size Jeep forums for Wagoneers, J Trucks...
Anyways my daily driver however is a 99 Jimmy 2Dr 4X4...I feel I've had all sorts of issues with it gave up taking it in for repairs and bought the service manuals to do my own...
Sometimes I just live with it's quirks..my previous 95 Sonoma long bed never gave me a single issue.
The Jimmy just rolled over 100,000 miles yesterday so I started thinking it was time I searched and joined a forum. For whatever reason...I love this thing, even though I curse it as a horrible lemon...
(Issue are, and your all probably quite familiar:..cooling system that seems to need flushed every once in a while, or you dont' get heat, crappy oil cooling setup, replaced those lines, more than I care for, replaced my wheel bearings twice up front, drivers door sagged, leaks air, almost sounds like I'm in a airplane, replaced the hinge pins to have it do it all over again, seat adjusters aren't worth it, about to take the seat apart and make a custom release lever, ball joints are bad. Rear diff cover rusted through, two broken bolts when I replaced it..what a PITA! Gas guage sending unit never worked ever..I have a replacement sender to put on the fuel pump, but afraid the fuel pump would die, so I'm just gonna do it all when I drop the tank or go through the cargo floor...okay I'll uh stop there before I write a boring book on things you guys have already seen, no doubt)...

My plans..to repaint this gal, it's that Cherry burgundy red currently...Might go all black. I wanna make it up like a Blazer ZR-2..
Custom leather seats..as much as I love the overhead console, I might go for a shorty version and a moon roof...maybe not. Replace the roof rack with a carrier style cargo rack.
Ceramic brake pads..after I get around to doing the wheel bearings up front for the third time.......
Anyways Hi all...

 

About the wheel bearings, do you replace these yourself? What brand do you use? Also, what do you torque the axle nut down to? Some have had issues with over-tightening and causing premature wear. Three sets of bearings in 100K miles seems a little excessive. I'm at about 83K and about to replace the factory ones with Timken-made bearings.

 

like i said, you should get answers to any questions you will have here, just make sure you post your questions in the right sections lol.

 

Welcome to the forum.

 

Sounds like you have had the plauge with your truck. Hopefully everyhing that is going to go wrong already has and its smooth sailing from here on out. But anyways welcome to the forum.

 

Welcome to the forum, glad to have you !!!!

 

Thanks guys..
As for the front wheel bearings..first and last time was with the dealer...$$$$$$, never again, second time was at a local garage and I'm sure he did it right, just that a year later they did indeed wear prematurely...he redid it at no cost. Next time I'm doing it myself, plus I have a brother that has done it himself who will be helping me. As for the rest of the stuff,I've done most it so far.
The last pita was finding a drivers door armrest in graphite...plus replacing the inside door handle&lock mechanism...(why did they make that outta plastic?).

Not sure on what brand of wheel bearing I'm gonna go with...and can't understand why it's just the front ones that go bad? I'm half afraid to replace them, just to have the rears go...lol. My other issue, whoever makes or remanufactures those bearings, do a crappy job with the ABS sensor wiring...I had to splice and re-wrap the wiring on the drivers front since it had frayed...and now it's bad again, my ABS intermittently kicks on at random when braking.

 

Welcome!

 

I'm sure you know this but just to clarify, the fronts are a complete hub assembly which is why they cost so dang much. The rears are a more traditional bearing and cost MUCH MUCH less (PN 29-6720).

Do you have a lot of rotating mass (heavy wheels/tires), wheel spacers, anything that would put extra wear and strain on the front assemblies?

 

Not particularly, I did install a hitch and have towed a small utility trailer, but nothing drastic load wise..
This truck for the 'moment' is all stock, save for the addition of a hitch.

I'm thinking of going the Timken route with the fronts...and redoing my ball joints and getting it realigned before I go to new tires here..shortly.