There are tons and tons of threads regarding individuals who have trouble removing their pilot bearings, etc... but my question is, is it worth the trouble? I'm on the fence about doing this because it was a pain in the *** in my JZ powered car even with my lift and this bearing seems sufficient and functional. I have the bearing here with the oem clutch kit, but I'd have to order the mazdatrix tool and I would like to save money and put it into other things. This car was bought "blown" with coolant seal failure at a very nice price and I have just had a rebuild done by Kevin @ RR so I'm looking to spend most of my budget on preventative measures in terms of cooling like a scangauge, new hoses, aluminum radiator, new oem w/pump, etc.


Let me know what you guys with experience and age with these cars think, I haven't been around here to know if pilot bearing failure is "common" with age or like with some cars that you can go hundreds of thousands of miles without changing one.

 

I've read that the right tool makes it a breeze. It's just a slide hammer.

Here's the bigger question: do you want to take the chance of having to pull the tranny again to do the pilot bearing?

 

even with the right tool riwwp and i were helping another member with his and couldnt get it out. using a dremel and carbide bit we very very carefully had to cut it out

 

 

Pilot bearing kit from Harbor Freight, noobs can’t search or tie their own shoes

 

i was using a snap on one team, the bearing literally was coming apart and was stuck in the hole. sometimes you gotta get creative

 

The HF freight one works fine, as does the one you can rent for free from Autozone. Luckily I have never had a problem removing one. But if you don't, you are taking a risk of having to pull everything again and I value my time now days so if I am in there, it's getting replaced.

 

i was using my brothers in his shop but the bearing was destroyed and stuck

 

Probably due to that great East Coast weather.

 

lol it was adams car. he drove it to pa from md with a shot clutch

btw not everyone in snowy areas drive their 8s in the winter. beater cars are very popular for a reason here

 

I didn't ask what to use or how to do it. I've taken out more pilot bearings than I can count and some have been horrendous while others so very easy... and the common denominator is that I have never had a pilot bearing failure. I've owned LS engines with 250k miles on the original bearing, also my JZ powered car had roughly 130k miles on the original bearing before I sold it and I don't drive my sports cars like I do my daily. I merely asked what is the general consensus on the longevity of the pilot bearings on these engines.. because a bearing may be just merely that but perhaps Mazda decided to use a cheaper bearing than other manufacturers and it is imperative to replace beyond 'x' miles? I wouldn't know because my search only yielded a couple failures, I don't have experience with 8s, and mostly people having trouble uninstalling an old one or installing a new one; in fact, it was glaringly clear that more people had problems putting a new one in than that had failures (at least in terms of posts found).


Anyways, I'm not replacing mine. The bearing is functional and shows no obvious signs of wear, input shaft has a darkened color but feels smooth, and I have a lift. It makes things so much easier and I can have my trans down in an hour so there is not a point to spend money on a tool to remove something that "might" fail when I can spend money replacing all the cooling accessories that more than likely led to failure of the engine for the previous owner. Maybe when I install sway bars and have to be under there. I guess I'm one of the few people that actually enjoy a night in the garage.

 

Trigger much? My bad then, sorry.

Not replacing it is foolish.

 

A lot of members have gone through much more headache replacing it than actually have with failures.... I can cite sources if you'd like. I just think it's uncool to act like I am some sort of idiot for not searching when I have and found 2 related topics specific to this question on nopistons and rx7club only and I suppose I have made my points above and if a failure happens before I change it out, I will come here to this post specifically and let you know just how much I regret not doing it.