Festiva Front Wheel Bearing Replacement using hand tools.

Festiva Front Wheel Bearing Replacement using your own hand tools.

Submitted by FestYboy of fordfestiva.com

Tools you will need:

Big Hammer

Socket large enough to fit the inner race of the bearing (where the cage is attached) at the thickest part. 27mm impact socket should do it.

24mm impact socket (needs to slip inside the ID of the bearing)

1/2" extension (acts as a handle)

14mm socket and matching ratchet (the longer the better)

 Cold chisel

Vice (firmly mounted and large enough to hold steering knuckle securely)

Block of wood 2x or 4x4

A race driver (for the races that must be firmly seated in the knuckle) I like the aluminum set from HarborFreight

And if you have it (life will be easier) a cut-off wheel (or angle grinder with a cutting wheel)

Instructions:

Remove the knuckle from the car (3 bolts, 1 nut, 1 tie rod) after removing the caliper of course. (See How To Remove Festiva Steering Knuckle)
Knock off any loose debris

Place the knuckle (upside down) in the vice and clamp the strut mount leaving enough clearance to allow the rotor to spin freely.

 (I find it easier to clamp it on the sides that the bolts DO NOT pass through.)  

Attach the 24mm socket to the extension and proceed to beat the hub out of the knuckle from the back side. It shouldn't take too much effort and if you're good, you'll be able to tap on the rotor the last few millimeters to pop it off and NOT lose the spacer ring (it can fly sometimes).

Now that the hub and knuckle are separated you can remove the inner bearing, the CV seal, both races and clean the knuckle.

Take the hub and remove the 4 14mm bolts to remove the rotor (replace bolts if they are badly rusted and rotor if it is warped or worn badly).

Now take the hub and place it in the vice (clamping the rotor mount).

With cold chisel in hand, walk off the outer bearing from the hub (or if you're so inclined: remove the bearing cage and with cut-off wheel in hand, make 1 cut at about 60* from perpendicular, just deep enough to touch the hub surface. From that cut, you can take the cold chisel and crack the bearing and walk it off nearly by hand).

Remove the outer wheel seal from the hub. You now have all the pieces separated (Yah!)

From here, the hub (cleaned and film of grease applied), wheel seal and a new bearing (packed with grease), place the hub facing up, install the wheel seal and place the bearing on the hub and block of wood on the bearing, knock the bearing flush.
You can take the bearing you just cut and use it to continue to seat the new bearing onto the hub.
Mount the rotor to the hub
Place the spacer on the hub (Make sure you put the same one you removed back on the hub that was in the same steering knuckle).

Install the races in the knuckle

Place the knuckle on the hub (still facing up)

Take your other new bearing (packed) and put it in the back of the knuckle and with the larger socket, knock it into place until the bearing stops moving into the knuckle.

Install the CV seal.

You're done


Note regarding the spacer selection, about which there is a lot of confusion:

Bearing preload spacer selection is relative to the steering knuckle, races, and bearings.
The hub is not even used in testing the drag in the preload spacer selection process. You really should use the selection tool and insert the proper spacer each time you rebuild the knuckle with new bearings.

The selection spacer tool acts as the hub, but slides into the bearings, rather than pressing in. 

Rebuilding your steering knuckles at home using the spacer that came out of the knuckle that you disassembled is the best option you have if you don't have sets of spacer rings and a spacer selection tool, but you can never know how long your bearings are going to last. New bearing races aren't always exactly the same size and different spacers may be needed when replacing bearings. 
If you have at least 4k miles on those newly replaced bearings and they still feel good with no slack or tight spots then I wouldn't worry. The bearings get very sloppy before things get unsafe, and you'll feel that when you use the brakes (excess pedal play) or you'll hear a droning hum.