Rear Wheel Bearing Difference, Comparison that may have caused my failures Options

[914Sixer]

For months now I have maintained there is a big difference in the quality of the new rear bearings verses the original ones. Today I had time to compare an original FAG (Germany)and a new SKF (Italy) bearing shells. MY conclusion is what I suspected, the new ones are NOT the same. I took pictures and measurements to document what I saw. I hope the pictures let you see the difference. Guess which one is the original German one!

[mepstein]

What's funny is once the bearing is in our car, we might let it go for 20+ years. Heat, cold, humidity, whatever.

[914_teener]

What's funny is once the bearing is in our car, we might let it go for 20+ years. Heat, cold, humidity, whatever.

What was posted has more to do with legal and liability than engineering.

Most distributors at our level don.t have means to track FIFO and when they go back to try and warranty a lot they have such a small claim it.s not worth it.

While it.s worth noting about care of bearings in storage, once they are in the car the grease is being distributed and iron oxide (rust) which will permantly f up the bearing is less likely to form if you drive your car regularly. One more reason to get out and drive your car.

If it fails in the car after a few years....they can always claim abuse or road damage. I think the OP makes a good point about the differences in the two manuf. of the bearings. When I replaced them in my car.....now a few years back I used FAG.s