Need help with rear axle hub quick!

[randym]

I'm in the process of replacing an axle seal on a 2001 8.1 Chev. Suburban with the 10 1/2" Saginaw full floater and have run into a snag. The caliphers are removed as well as the hub retainer, key and nut but the hub will only move about 1/8" before it stops and does not want to move any futher. I have given it some pretty fair raps with a hammer but can't gain any ground. The backing plate and emergency brake is still on but I don't think that has anything to do with it because it is attached to the spindle. Anyone have an idea as to what could be holding the hub on?

[ 04-06-2002: Message edited by: randym ]</p>

[mark45678]

I havent had a disk brake rear apart yet but it sound like you have missed the circle clip and keyway .look at it very closely with a flashlight you should find a very thin flat wire clip that holds in a 1/8" keyway,then the nut will come off! make sure you set the bearing to the proper spec when you put it back on or you will be looking for a new houseing!!!! if your not sure loose is better!

[randym]

Thanks for the reply, but I got it shortly after I posted the question; I decided that nothing that was going to break was holding it so I took the axle bolted it to the hub (axle pointed out) with some long bolts so that there was about 2" slack between the hub and the axle and used the axle as a slide hammer. The hub came right off with the seal and the inner bearing remaining on the spindle, inner bearing came off with no effort then the seal was pried off using a large screwdriver. The seal is strange to me, a seal within a seal affair, in which the inside seals to the spindle and the outside seals to the hub and neither surface is made to be rotated against. The rotation occurs within the seal itself, two separate halves with some sealing device between the two; I may cut it into later to see how it works. Also of note is the size of the emergency brake which it a conventional drum break affair, the drum being the inside of the hub. The drum is about 9" or 10" in diameter (now wish I had measured when it was off) and the shoes have a width of about 1 3/4"; looks like a heck of a back up system in the unlikelyhood that the big double piston discs over heat to the point of needing help. Also the nut isn't bad to get off at all, because it is basicly just at a snug tightness like a conventional axle nut, it has round holes at the outer edge and you have just enough room to get a round punch on them and using a hammer loosen the nut which is held in check by a 3/16" keyway key.

[ 04-07-2002: Message edited by: randym ]</p>