I have little experience with these sealed bearings. My stock ones had to be changed at 50k miles. Now I'm at 130k and they're making noise again. It sure seems like I never had to change the old greaseable wheel bearings.

Is this a Dakota thing? or do all sealed bearings suck?

 

customers prefer maintenance free sealed bearings...the cost at a shop to repack the old style is the cost of a hub/bearing assembly. I'm glad they are gone.

repackable tapered bearings do seem to last longer but only the dyi benefit from this.

make sure you put in high quality bearings....I've seen $50 sealed bearings be bad right out of the box.

 

I just hit 160k miles on my Dakota. Within past few months I've replaced inner and outer tie rods, upper ball joints, and now wheel bearings. However the wheel bearings didn't solve my problem, turns out my front tires are cupped bad and vibrating horrifically when I turn. Lower ball joints are next. One of my wheel bearings were bad, the other wasn't. I had the shop look at my old ones after I pulled them and they said they weren't very old, although they were on the truck when I got it about 40k to 50k miles ago. I'm assuming it's a Dakota thing. I did go cheap on them at $75 a piece, but they seem pretty good so far.

 

the cause of cupped tires is the total toe setting not set correctly.

If you have worn parts; replace them...then get the vehicle aligned. When they are done aligning it....check the toe measurement with the vehicle sitting on the ground at normal ride height...use a tape measure. the total toe should be 1/16 inch toe in. The toe has to be set correctly the cupping/feather edge wear will occur again.

 

I always understood cupping was due to worn shocks......

 

I agree. Had this issue on my car before. My rear tires had flat spots on them from my worn shocks letting them bounce down the road.

 

cupping can occur from bad shocks on independant from suspension and its due to toe change as the suspension jounces and rebounds. its less likely on solid axles. I driven many vehicles with zero damping and no cupping present
people see feather edge toe wear and think its cupping.

cupping occurs across the face of the tire....toe wear usually occurs at an edge but can occur across the face is the tire is a bias ply tire or a light vehicle with a stiff sidewall....radial tires flex and the featheredge wear occurs only at the edge.

post a pic of your treadwear