Has anyone replaced bearings in their Vidmars?

I have a couple of Vidmar drawer carriages where the bearings are starting to give up. These are riveted in but these bearings can be sourced and bolted on I'm thinking. Just wondered if anyone has done this.

Thanks

No, but I need to.

I trashed a carriage last year and now I wish I had kept it to try this out on.

I had some that i thought were bad. I flushed them out and used a syringe to inject new grease and they felt like new.

In searching the archives, I didn’t find the details of anyone who had actually replaced a bearing on a Vidmar drawer so I thought I’d add on to this older thread to show what I had done if anyone is searching in the future.
I picked up a 6 drawer Vidmar rolling chest on CL last week, it needed a lot of cleaning and a couple of replacement parts. One of them was the front bearing on a drawer slide. The stock bearings are swaged on and there is only about 0.090” clearance on the outside of the drawer frame rail for a nut. I ordered the bearing and a shoulder screw from McMaster Carr:

6383K19 Steel Ball Bearing, Plain Open for 3/8" Shaft Diameter, 15/16" OD, 5/16" W

91829A307 18-8 Stainless Steel Precision Slotted Shoulder Screw, 3/8" Shoulder Diameter, 5/16" L Shoulder, 1/4"-20 Thread

I ground down the outside of the old bearing mount flush with the frame, and then it easily knocked out with a punch. I was planning on grinding a ¼-20 nut down to make it thinner. But I found a small sheetmetal clip in a bin of junk (part of a saddle clamp from an icemaker kit?) that was the right thickness and ¼-20 tapped already. As a bonus the thread protrusion fit inside the slightly oversized hole on the frame and gave the bolt plenty of thread. Before installing the bearing (as to not overheat it) I took the grinder to remove the excess thread length on the bolt, then installed the bearing with a drop of Loctite. There was plenty of clearance for the head of the bolt between the bearing and drawer.
Still a little more cleanup work needed on the rest of the box, but I’ll post some pictures of the rest of it when I’m done.

If you want to do some research, search for cam roller bearing drawer slide
look at google images

https://www.mcmaster.com/#cam-bearings/=16b6bqf


https://www.google.com/search?q=bea...B#tbm=isch&q=cam+roller+bearing++drawer+slide



http://www.pbclinear.com/LP/Cam-Roller-Technology-CRT

I did what billp603 did...

Ordered bearing and bolt mentioned above..



Flattened a 1/4-20 T nut and trimmed it to length. And assembled onto drawer with red loctite. Then trimmed excess length off the threaded end.





Works great!!

These can be repaired...

I realize this is a zombie thread, but I feel compelled to add my $.02.
My Vidmar is older and was purchased with one bearing having the outer race completely missing, and a few others that may need attention in the near future. As of this writing, the parts previously suggested from McMaster-Carr total right around $30 shipped. This seemed a bit much for the modest investment I have in my unit. Following in the footsteps of billp603, I purchased a couple items from ebay (I will not link the auction as in the future it will be useless, but will include the description)

628 ZZ Ball Bearing Deep Groove Double Shield 8mmx24mmx8mm - $10 shipped (24mm = 0.945" : 15/16 = 0.938")
5pcs Hex Socket Shoulder Bolt 8mm Shoulder Dia 8mm Shoulder Length M6 Thread - $12.16 shipped

1. First order is drilling out the original bearing stud. Mine had 5/16" holes, but a much larger drill works fine, just stop when you are flush with the parent material and use pliers to remove the bearing.
2. Use reasonable methods to get the shoulder bolt pressed into one of the new bearings and install a washer to keep the bearing outer race from rubbing on the drawer slide.
3. I had a cheapo metric bolt kit that has 5mm lock washers. Two of these stacked together worked perfect for adapting the 6mm stud to just a few mils bigger than the 5/16" hole in the drawer slide frame. I used some Knipex to get the washer started on the threads, then a 6mm nut to send them home. (The lock washer slits look aligned in the picture, but I rotated them 180 degrees after installation).

4. I used a "Q" sized drill bit to open the hole in the drawer slide frame slightly so the OD of the lock washers would fit snugly in the hole.
5. Screwed the assembly down with a 6mm nut (red loctite), then a little grinder work to keep the nut from interfering with the closure.




Using this method, I had $22 in parts (plus junk drawer stuff) and have enough bearings for 10 repairs and enough screws for 5 repairs. The reveal between this drawer and the next after the replacement looks excellent. Best of luck.

Luckily the only bad bearings I've had ended up just being stuck. Bust em loose, fresh grease, good as new.

We have 90 cabinets at work that need bearings. They sell the trays to replace them. That's the way we will go it would take too much labor to fix them.