Best Center Support Driveshaft Bearing

[lincmercguy]

On my '12 3500 4wd (stock suspension/driveline), I was getting a noise at speed that was getting more annoying. Looking into it, I found it was the center support bearing on the driveshaft. It wasn't seized l and the rubber was fine, just noisy when spinning. With 110k miles, not a big deal, just a wear item. I got one from O'Reily Auto and replaced it. Noise was gone and I was happy. No vibrations or other issues before or after.

Less than 500 miles later, we took a trip into the foothills and started hearing a noise about 15 miles from home. Sure enough, the rubber had broken out. I drove it home about 30mph. I'm not sure if bearing is actually seized or not, but the rubber has definitely torn loose.

It's an easy enough fix, but what brand of bearing should I get? Reliability is more important than low cost for me.

 

[ripping r]

well the factory one went 110k. i would put a factory one back in.

 

[crazy jerry]

i stay away from autoparts store items as its mostly cheap junk. napa might have something good like skf or nsk. other wise the factory bearing is likely the next safest bet

 

[lincmercguy]

I was going off who had it with O'Reilly. Napa was $300 at the time for some reason, but about the same as Mopar now.

I ended up getting a Mopar from Rock Auto by p/n since DHL shipping in 2 days was only a couple bucks more than standard. It doesn't show under the normal lookup for some reason. Hopefully it lasts.

I checked it last night after the cat cooled off. The bearing still spins fine, but the rubber part just came apart. Bad materials or too thin, I guess. I'm sure they won't want to refund me.

 

[lincmercguy]

Update: The Mopar replacement went on without an issue. I haven't put a ton of miles on since, but I check the new bearing every now and then to make sure there are no issues. So far, so good. The rubber part still looks brand new, so I think this one will be fine.