front wheel bearing life
 

My front right started making some noise a couple of months ago. Dropped the car off and they say both front wheel bearings need to be replaced. Under warranty :)

Anyway, wondering what kind of life trackhounds are getting out of these items. I took delivery of my car 12 months ago, have done 13 track days this year, on the order of 13 track hours. Mileage is at 25,500 (massive commute).

I got 46k miles, 36 trackdays, and over 200 autox events before I had to replace mine (actually doing them as soon as they come in on Thursday).

Around 50 hours of track use and around 40k miles out of my front bearings. 60-70 hours of track (and same street millage, car is now a trailer car) for the rear ones. I run relatively heavy aero (at least heavy for stock power), for what its worth.

This kinda confirms that my setup is somewhat hosed...

Because of points situation to be in T40 with COMSCC, my only mods are:
Raceseng camber plates
Swift BRZ Sport springs
17x9 wheels, 245 RE71R tires

Springs and camber plates put the car 1.5" lower in front and 1.25" lower in back (lower than the 1.1"/1" advertised for the springs). This put the front of the car *hard* onto the bump stops. So I cut bump stops way down and also added in 0.25" spacers between the front springs and the Raceseng spring perches. So now ride height is -1.25" all around.

The car still leans *heavily* on the outside front during hard cornering. Which may have actually helped me a bit on track by limiting body roll. But at the expense of ride quality on the street and front tire life at the track!

Has me thinking about a different approach this year, either:
RCE Yellow springs for stiffer front spring rate and nearly 1/2" higher ride height
or
Different camber plates that don't raise front of the car more than .25" *and* don't take away bump travel (Raceseng ones don't raise ride height at all, but looks to me like they reduce bump travel by about 12-15mm)

But reluctant to change because the weird-o setup worked great for 2018, won my class and overall championships with COM!

5 YEARS of hard tracking, my last 100 thou on stock motor, currently doing the next 100 thou on a built motor.
15 1/2 lb., 18 in. wheels with 245 40 track tires. (Heavier set up in winter).

Lots of 200 tread wear tires and brake pads wore out, on my 4th set of discs but the wheel bearings are still original, still fine.
My ears however have never recovered from the squeeeeeeking noises of race pads. :(
:burnrubber:

86k miles, 20 track days, prob over 200 autox events and DD duty the whole time. Front right started to go and I just replaced them all. Easy and quick to change out. Fronts needed it for sure, rears might have had a few more track events before they needed to be replaced.

What's the offset on those big 17x9s?

+40 6UL and +35 TC105n.

I don't think it's the offset though. Based on front tire wear at the track, I think it's my dynamic roll stiffness distribution moving to the front as soon as the outside front is into the bump stop, which is soon... I think my setup just loads the outside front too much.

I run the exact same 6UL's.

Yeah, +40 is pretty conservative, and even +35 is commonly used successfully. It definitely sounds like your suspension setup needs some refinement, though I'm not sure if it's your relative roll stiffness, or lack thereof... But in the end, being on the bumpstops certainly isn't helping anything. If adding ride height isn't an option, then stiffen up your spring rates a bit more and/or do away with the bumpstops entirely (not such a great solution, but cheap and easy enough to do to prove your theory)... Or add larger swaybars in a matched set so you don't impact the overall balance.

Wheel bearings isn't something I see going too commonly on this platform.

Would be curious to see long term results!

Dan, did you notice any benefit using a "lowering spring" vs the stock spring?

Could you install a set of Koni or Bilstein dampers?

Sent from my Pixel 3 using Tapatalk

I have 15k miles and 4 track days. I don't like the way my left front bearing feels. It's slightly stickier then the right front but isn't rumbling or anything. When I switch back to race pads in the spring I'll check it again.

Posting because after one lousy track day and 26K commuting miles, my fronts are making a racket and last night's steering test indicates I have at least one roasted front wheel bearing. Actually, it started making noise about a week before the track day, which I attributed to the Azenis running in.

Urgh.
@ZDan what is your build date?

Edit - ok, this weird. I put it up and yanked on the fronts side-side and up-down. It's not the wheel bearings. It's the right side of the rack. WTF? Oh well, at least that isn't going to self-combust. That can wait for a warranty check.