[2009camryowner]

In about August of 2012, I found that a speed-dependent hum was coming from the rear driver's side wheel well of my 66,000mi 2009 Camry LE. The hum would peak at different speeds over time until it finally made an almost deafening sound near 72mph. Under 40mph and there was hardly anything.

I rotated the tires, but the sound continued to come from the same location. That led me to believe it was a moving part and the only choices were an issue with the brakes or an issue with the wheel bearing hub assembly.

I ordered a new hub assembly (p/n 512206)
http://www.autozone.com/autozone/parts/_/N-5yc1s?itemIdentifier=95531

The rear passenger side part number is 512207
http://www.autozone.com/autozone/parts/Duralast-Wheel-Bearing-Hub-Assembly-Rear/_/N-6o2nz?itemIdentifier=95532&_requestid=328673

I followed the Haynes manual and removed the tire, the brake caliper, and the brake drum. I also disconnected the speed sensor wire from the wheel bearing assy. That is accomplished using a screw driver being inserted in a direction outward from the car and on the rear side of connector.

At this point the manual has you remove the 4 carrier bolts that tie the heatshield, parking brake assy, and wheel bearing hub assy from the knuckle.

What I was left with was the parts not coming loose from the car. A couple of rubber mallet strikes was enough to pop all of the parts loose (albeit stuck together), but what I am about to share doesn't require for them to be removed en mass from the car.

At this point I was stuck with the hub assy being stuck to the parking brake / heat shield assy. It's a tight fit and there was enough corrosion and loading that the parts were inseparable. To make matters worse, I couldn't find any hub puller that would work nor is there any geometry that allows for them to be pried apart. Many strikes on the back of the hub assy was also futile as there was no way to hold the heat shield to really make the strikes 'count'. I used PB blaster in conjunction with this and it wasn't enough.

I really didn't want to replace the parking brake assy and I have yet to find guidance on how to separate the parts. That's why I am sharing my experience.

The solution I found costs $2.68 and resulted in no notable damage to either set of parts:

Go to your local Home Depot, Lowe's, or bucket of leftover hardware. I used a 1/2" x 6" carriage bolt (any large bolt that is threaded the entire length should work), a hex nut, and a flat washer.

1) Remove or disconnect as much or as little of the parking brake assy as necessary so that the bolt can be placed through the wheel hub access hole you used to remove the 4 carrier bolts.

2)Position the wheel hub's wheel-side plate such that this access hole lines up over the heat shield and not the other half of the wheel hub.

3) Insert the bolt through the access hole and thread the washer and then the hex nut onto it. Thread them down until the bolt tip makes contact with the heat shield and the washer makes contact with the inside surface of the wheel-side hub plate.

4)Grab the hex nut with a pair of locking pliers.

(The bolts available at Lowes were either carriage bolts that were threaded the entire length, but with a rounded top or hex bolts that only had about an inch of threads at the end. I used a carriage bolt because it does have a square profile just below the head and I could use a wrench to grab that. In reality, there's probably a dozen diffent ways to go about this, but the concept remains the same.)

5) Grab the head or square portion of the carriage bolt shaft with an adjustable wrench.

6) Start rotating the the bolt, keeping the nut fixed. This will increase the distance between the outer bearing hub plate and the heat shield. You should notice quickly that hub assemly is moving out of the heat shield cutout.

7) If the hub assemby does not pop out immediataly, I'd suggest relocating the bolt to another location around the circumference of the heatshield and repeating the process to keep things even and have the hub assy come out in normal direction.

At this point, CONGRATS.

If you had to disassemble a portion of the parking brake assy, here is a parts diagram to help you put it back together:

http://www.toyotapartsoverstock.com/showAssembly.aspx?ukey_product=3985068&ukey_assembly=517272&ukey_make=1060&ukey_model=15428&ukey_driveline=6770&ukey_trimlevel=18261&modelYear=2009

I hope this helps others faced with the same dilemma I faced without any guidance from Haynes or Toyota or the intrawebs on how to peel the parts apart. I am an aerospace engineer and not a mechanic, so there's probably other well-known methods, but this worked for me and saved me a trip to the shop.

Good luck.

 

[donbryce]

Not sure if I'll run into the same issue with the rear hub on my '02 Camry, but the part is exactly the same, the internals of the heat shield design might be different. From your description of the job, we are using the bolt/nut as a puller would work to 'push' the hub assy. out of the flange/hole?
The postman just dropped off my new hub. Right away I notice that the access holes drilled in the outer flange are smaller than the one on the stock hub. This might make it awkward to get a socket in there for the 4 bolts....job is pending the weather warming up, right now 20 farenheit in the garage, too expensive for the electric furnace. BTW, hub assy. was $98.00 delivered/taxes paid out of MA, about 2 weeks delivery. Would've been $270.00 aftermarket locally, same 2 weeks for delivery, so I'm OK with lesser quality for a grocery-getter.

Edit: On second glance, the hole that lines up with the parking brake coil springs appears missing.The OEM is big enough for my tool to go right in.

 

[2009camryowner]

Check with your 14mm socket head.

You can check to see whether the access holes are big enough with your 14mm socket head in the warm confines of your kitchen. I'd bet dollars to pesos you'll be fine. If not, you'd probably have to remove the parking brake parts and connect the socket head after you pass the racket extension through the wheelside plate.

Good luck. I can't tell you how nice it felt to test drive the car with the new bearing hub, no noise, and money still in my pocket that'd otherwise go to the mechanic's boat payment.

And yes, the bolt/nut/washer is being used to break the hub free from the parking brake assembly at the round cutout on the heat shield that the hub fits through. The bolts keep the hub from rotating and handle side loading primarily. The male insert on the hub transfers the shear loading (ie. gravity and forward-aft loads) and therefore needs to have a tight fit.

 

[inov8]

I just finished replacing the left rear hub and bearing assembly on my '05 Avalon with ~62K miles. Same hum; same problem with the hub frozen to the park brake backing plate; same annoyance with lack of guidance in the factory repair manual.

Like 2009camryowner, I tried PB Blaster and futile whacks with a big fat dead-blow mallet. Then I decided to try the Internet, and stumbled upon this post.

My profuse thanks to 2009 camryowner for posting his solution. My vehicle was 8 years old, so the parts were possibly even more fused than his. I had to reposition the carriage bolt 5 or 6 times, but the hub eventually separated, just like he said it would, and I was able to complete the job.

Reassembling the parking brake was a royal pain. I ended up temporarily bolting the backing plate to the knuckle with one bolt, which held it in a fixed position while assembling the various springs and retainers. Then I removed the bolt, and mounted the hub. I could not see any clear pathways the the backing plate without removing both park brake shoes.

 

[inov8]

Thought I would return the favor by posting an illustration. At first, I found it difficult to visualize where the end of the bolt had to be positioned. The parking braks backing plate is drawn as a transparent disk so not to obscure the carriage bolt. It is actually solid black.

 

[Donald E. George]

When you replace a component like this one, you should use some anti-seize on the mating surfaces to prevent rust. This has worked for me for years. I always remove the brake discs from a new vehicle and burnish some anti-seize into the mating surfaces. The stufff stays for years and makes disassembly easy. Regards

 

[inov8]

Yes; I wish the Toyota factory had taken your advice .

 

[Joey1220]

I used that meathod but purchased 1/2 inch by 6 hex head bolts. When it broke free it made a huge pop. My only advise to anyone is to use a 14 mm 6 point socket on the bolts that hold the hub in place. Im thinking the hub being worn heats everything up and makes it a royal pain to get the hub bolts out. you are able to move the parking brake pads either left or right to get the socket in there. Yes hub sucks to get off but the bolt thing did the trick. Thank you for the great advise.

 

[somethingelse]

2006 Corolla XRS

I realize this is an old thread, but really appreciate the info here. I did a brake job (calipers, rotors, pads) on a '06 Corolla XRS (i.e. all disc) in hopes of solving a grinding noise that I thought was caused by the dust shields rubbing on the rotors only to find that my rear hubs were badly warped. If you're in a similar situation, one easy way to tell if the hubs are bad is to mount the rotor backwards to the hub and spin it around to see if it holds a straight line.

Once I knew the hubs were bad, I ordered a pair of aftermarket ones from rockauto.com (PN is 512217, I went with Power Stop), but I was still left with the daunting task of removing the original hub from the backing plate. The 4 bolts holding the entire thing to the frame came off easily, but the actual hub was so rusted to the backing plate that there was no way any amount of PB Blaster and hammering would ever separate it. Most of the general forum consensus suggests everything from excessive force to slide hammers to other methods that clearly aren't suited for rear disc setups. But thanks to the advise here, I got the biggest (note, don't go longer than you need - they'll bend right over) threaded hex bolts I could find (3" x 3/8-16 - 2pk for $2) and was able to finally separate the two.

A couple other notes... You may as well just go ahead and remove the parking brake springs (might need to replace them). You'll probably need to hammer out a few studs to get the right angle for the hex bolts used to pull the hubs out. If you want (or need) to give up on separating the hub from backing plate, you can purchase new rear backing plates for a 2006 Corolla by searching for PN 46503-20070 (rear right) or 46504-20070 (rear left). Just a heads up that the list price is $310.88 and you're still looking at $200 online.

Good luck to anyone else who finds themselves trying to separate a rusted hub assembly from a backing plate! If you've gotten this far, the end is in sight!

Added some pics for those interested.

 

[Greasymechtech]

When I replaced my bearing/hubs earlier this year on my '08 Highlander, there wasn't much left of the backing plates. And, they were expensive but lasted 10+ years, many in a road salted winter area.

I don't recommend the job for the faint of heart. A couple pic's here give you an idea how far I had to go to do the job correctly.
https://www.toyotanation.com/forum/...eration-2008-2013/1614554-rear-brake-job.html

 

[somethingelse]

Thanks for the link. I was able to re-use my backing plates this time around. Next time the job will probably be more extensive... :/

 

[Alan43]

Thank You !!!

OMG, thank you 2009camryowner !!! I registered to this forum just so I could reply to your thread !!! I share my garage with my wife, three daughters, and three dogs... so I have to rearrange my entire garage every time there's car work to do. I pulled my 2008 Camry halfway into the garage and disassembled the entire left rear side, only to find the dang hub rust-welded to the heat shield (not one of the repair videos I watched had THIS problem - the rear hubs just always fell out, so I thought). I seemed obvious that I'd have to disassemble the parking brake entirely so that I could take the assembly into a shop for pressing... but since my car was HALFWAY into the garage, I had to reassemble the entire thing just to move my car (either deeper in, or all the way out) !!! Frustrated, I decided I would be done for the day and repeat the entire process next weekend, to include parking brake disassembly and a trip to the shop (if I could find one during the week willing to do the pressing). Defeated after reassembly, I Googled "separate hub from parking brake assembly" and your posting was the first link listed. YOU are brilliant, and a hero for sharing your creativity. I will try your technique tomorrow and will post my results. Thanks again !!! Wish me luck...

 

[Alan43]

Thank goodness, it worked like a charm !!! The first time I tried with the parking brake and pads in place. The bolt ended up hitting the dust shield and didn't work as expected (marked up the dust shield and made a small dent from the force). So I disassembled the parking brake and pads... then I could get the bolts directly on the heavy steel backing plate. Tip: hold the bolt so it does not turn, and only turn the nut (if you turn the bolt, it will wander). I sprayed some WD-40 where the hub meets the backing plate and turned the nuts. BINGO... came right out no issues, no pop. The hub came out much easier than I expected. Thank you again 2009camryowner !!! This trick was a life-saver !!!

 

[mikeee161]

I am at the same spot as you were. Parking brake still on, bolt wandering, dust shield marked up ,etc. I will try your way with everything removed, but I am wondering what type of bolt you used? It seems a bit larger than the small 3 inch bolt recommended in an earlier post by someone else. I am having an issue with the bolt threads becoming damaged in the middle because the bolt is wandering and at the tip where it makes contact with the dust shield/steel backing

Thank goodness, it worked like a charm !!! The first time I tried with the parking brake and pads in place. The bolt ended up hitting the dust shield and didn't work as expected (marked up the dust shield and made a small dent from the force). So I disassembled the parking brake and pads... then I could get the bolts directly on the heavy steel backing plate. Tip: hold the bolt so it does not turn, and only turn the nut (if you turn the bolt, it will wander). I sprayed some WD-40 where the hub meets the backing plate and turned the nuts. BINGO... came right out no issues, no pop. The hub came out much easier than I expected. Thank you again 2009camryowner !!! This trick was a life-saver !!!

 

[cadesmarais]

Thank you very much 2009camryowner 🔔📣🔔📣! ....for your insights as an aerospace engineer. Similar to you I was stuck when I got to separating these 2 parts.

I was trying to replace the brake/shield and your technique did the trick without damage to the wheel bearing assembly. Clearly without this clever 'push and separate' set-up, the only other solution was with press where I found DIYer who had 5 ton press in his garage - but in the end destroyed the bearing and bent the brake/sheild out of shape, although he suggested it would be easy to straighten out.

My only suggested add on is to get a pair of carriage bolt/nut and washer to install right off the bat to relieve the rusty weld joint. Considering the negligible cost, its seems worth it.

Kudos and thanks again.