Rear Wheel Bearings, Comparsions ? Options

[914Sixer]

DO we know for a fact the Chinese bearings are poorly made? Does anyone have any real world use to report? I have some I am going to use. These bearings are made to ISO 9000 spec. This is an international standard for manufactures, SO why wouldn't that be as good as the other bearing manufactures? Are we sticking our nose in the air over nothing? The European parts manufactures do not seem to want to make the parts for our old cars.

What will really blow you away is the amount of VW parts now being made in China. Do a Google and see what comes up. I was amazed.

[jd74914]

ISO 9000 is not a bearing-specific standard. It also doesn't guarantee a quality product but is difficult enough to get that, like Jeff said, it does prove that you have a legitimate company with some quality assurance system in place.

That said, while I haven't tried any Chinese wheel bearings, other Chinese bearings I have used have been comparable in quality to FAG, Timkin, SKF, etc.

[Als914]

ISO 9000 is not a bearing-specific standard. It also doesn't guarantee a quality product but is difficult enough to get that, like Jeff said, it does prove that you have a legitimate company with some quality assurance system in place.

That said, while I haven't tried any Chinese wheel bearings, other Chinese bearings I have used have been comparable in quality to FAG, Timkin, SKF, etc.

Jim, you are close.
first, ISO is a word derived from isos, a Greak word meaning EQUAL. In order to do business in various parts of the world that requires ISO certification a manufacturer would need to be certified to meet international stds.. If this bearing Mftr. does it's own designe work then it must be ISO9001 certified meaning that engineering would have it's own quality critea.
All this does not guarantee a defective bearing. What it does guarantee is that an ISO manufacturing process is capable of a 1.33Cpk rejects parts/million or < 94 parts per million rejects.
As a retired plant manager and head internal ISO auditor I can pass on to you this is not easy stuff. My plants certification cost >$150K and a year to acheive certification. This is only the tip of the iceberg. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wacko.gif) And you do not want to loose certification!! So continuous quality improvement is paramount.