Club Car 2003 1/2 hub

jsmith294

Hi - First time poster, so please be gentle! I've owned a 2003 Club Car DX S/N: AA 0329-3000803. I stripped a stud in a front hub while trying to replace a leaking front wheel. I assume that I will need to take a grinder to the lug nut, and the that hub itself will need to be replaced. Unfortunately, the hub part number changed in model year "2003 1/2" (my luck). It looks like one difference is that the pre-2003 1/2 hub uses a metal spindle cap, while the post-2003 1/2 spindle has a plastic spindle cap. Short of inspecting the hub to check the material (the cart is 1000 miles away in Florida), is there any way to determine which hub I need from the cart serial number?

Great site, by the way. I love the rebuild threads!

BGW

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mrgolf

The 0329 means the 29 th week of production in 2003 year. Boy it sure is close to 2003 1/2. I would be afraid to say without looking at the hub.

jsmith294

Thanks, Mr. Golf, at least I now know how to narrow down the production date! What lousy luck. Why couldn't the number have been 0301? I was the one to strip out the stud, but for the life of me I can't remember whether those covers are plastic or metal. If anything, I would be leaning toward metal. The cart is at our vacation house. The plan was to copy down the S/N, go back home to civilization, order the part, and take it back on our next visit.

I'm new to the golf cart world and its customer service standards. Do you think I could call up Club Car and get the original part number from them?

glassk

The stud should just pop out like on a car,...

Attached Images

hub.JPG (83.0 KB, 0 views)

Htownblue

Replace the hub as a unit. Your bearings are worn. I can almost assure you of that if they are the originals. Replace both and enjoy a better ride. 40 bucks or so well spent.

jsmith294

Thanks for the drawing, glassk. One would think that the stud would pop out. Unfortunately, I really did a number on it. The cart is used right beside the Gulf of Mexico, so it is prone to corrosion. Before removing the wheel, I wire brushed the lug nut ends and sprayed them with PB Blaster. The first three nuts fought me but they came off. The final one came about halfway off and then the entire stud began to rotate in its hole in the hub.

There was not enough of the stud head protruding from the hub backside to get a counterhold with vice grips, so I could not turn the lug nut any farther. Without a full complement of tools, I cleaned and greased the three good studs, tightened the three good lug nuts and resigned myself to refilling the tire a couple of times each day to compensate for the slow leak. For the rest of the vacation we operated the cart with only three tightened lug nuts on that front wheel.

Unfortunately the nut is still stuck and partially loosened on the stripped stud. To get the stud out of the hub I will either need to grind off the lug nut or cut off the corner of the hub. If I can get the nut off, the stud will fall right out. I could replace it, but either the stud hole or the stud head socket in the hub are reamed out. Unless studs with oversized splines are available, I will be left with a replacement stud that rotates in it hub hole, possibly preventing me from tightening or loosening the lug nut. If there are any suggestions for salvaging a hub with a stripped stud hole, I would love to hear them.

This has been a hard lesson for me. These carts are little automobiles and need to be treated as such. On a full sized car I never would have risked something as catastrophic as a stripped or broken wheel stud. Instead of one PB Blaster application there would have been at least a half dozen. In retrospect I should have advanced the nut a half turn, sprayed the backside of the nut, backed up the nut, brushed and sprayed the front threads, and repeated. It would have also helped if I had cleaned and greased the loosened nuts as they came off and then retorqued them. Respect your equipment, and live and learn, I guess… or more succinctly, don’t be a lazy dumb ***!

jsmith294

Thanks for the suggestion, Htownblue, and I was inclined to replace the hubs as a unit. However, I am still left with the 2003 1/2 question. I had assumed that when the hub design changed the front spindle design changed as well. I still need to know whether I need the pre-2003 1/2 kits or the post-2003 1/2 kits. It would be nice if I could look up the required part number based on my S/N.

jsmith294

I am an engineer. In fact, I am an engineering professor who has been teaching machine design, including threaded fasteners, shafts, bearings, etc., for more than three decades. Club Car seemed to use the automotive wheel bearing design (tapered roller bearings) for decades with no problems. It is necessary to clean and repack this design every so often, but it incredibly rugged. From the pictures, it looks like the new post-2003 1/2 hub design has sealed ball bearings that do not require periodic maintenance. I can't tell if they are angular contact bearings or radial contact.

In my experience sealed ball bearings like this still need to have the seal popped and be cleaned and regreased if they are going to be long lived. Even with periodic lubrication, the life of a ball bearing is likely to be an order of magnitude less than an equivalent size/quality tapered roller bearing in the same application. If the application sees significant thrust loads (as with the case with these carts in turns), the difference can be even greater. If my car has the automotive style wheel bearings, I want to stick with them.

jjance

Were you using air tools?

mrgolf

To get the stud off. Remove the nut holding the hub on. Remove the wheel / hub assembly. Take a cut off wheel angle grinder and cut the offending stud off. My guess is you can go to an auto parts store and find a replacement stud. I'm pretty sure that will work.