Swing Axle Rear Wheel Bearings - Plastic vs Metal Cage Question

[sjbartnik]

Hi all
I ask this question in this form because I suspect this is the forum where someone is most likely to know the answer

I have a '65 swing-axle Type 3. As we all know, the swing-axle cars use a single massive ball bearing as a rear wheel bearing. In the blue Bentley when discussing replacing rear wheel bearings, they offer this caution under the heading Important!:

Does anyone have any insight as to why they make a point of noting that only plastic cage bearings should be used and why it is important?

I'm wondering if maybe it has something to do with the bearings running in gear oil rather than grease? Or something else entirely?
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1965 Volkswagen 1500 Variant S
2000 Kawasaki W650

[modok]

Reading that I "read between the lines" two general truths
-metal cage ball beings being cheaper and inferior to those with nylon/phenlolic cages
-A deep groove ball bearing often having max thrust load rating opposite the direction it was assembled.
And those are still true. The reality hasn't changed. It's still all true.

That said the OE bearings had metal cages and were good enough most of the time, and still are, literally, I'm still using USEd bearings to get by.

IMO main two reasons WHY the bearing would fail repeatedly..... is that when a bearing fails it's very difficult to CLEAN the contamination out of the axle tube, and IF the bearing failed there is a high chance the axle is distorted and you can't really check that IN PLACE very easily.
So update the update with that.
You put a NEW on an loose oval shaft and feed it metal dust then....
it's not going to live long.
You put a DECENT bearing on a round shaft, in a CLEAN environment, pack it lightly with calcium sulfonate grease, it will work very nice, no matter what material the cages are.

[esde]

I have a giant pile of good used rear axle bearings saved, and they all have steel cages. I don't even think I've ever seen one with a plastic cage
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modok wrote:
Bent cranks are silent but gather no moss. I mean, ah, something like that.

[sjbartnik]

The ones that I believe to be original to my car have a plastic cage. Can't remember if they are SKF or FAG but they are marked GERMANY so they're at least old enough to have been made in Germany

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1965 Volkswagen 1500 Variant S
2000 Kawasaki W650