Tapered roller bearings can be set at initial machine assembly to any desired axial or radial clearance. This unique feature enables a designer to control bearings to meet anticipated application operating conditions, and thereby provide optimum bearing and system performance.

Bearing Setting With tapered roller bearings, the term “setting” simply in-dicates the specific amount of end-play (axial clearance) or pre-load (axial interference) within a mounted bearing. The flexibility to easily adjust and optimize setting at the time of assembly is an inherent advantage of tapered roller bearings.For a bearing assembly that takes both weight and side-to-side thrust like a wheel bearing, tapered roller is better with all other things being equal. In places where the thrust load is taken up by a different bearing than the one that carries the weight (for example, some types of solid rear axles).