Peter, Over the years we have received a few message like your but in each case the solution was to simply de-burr the ends of the silver steel. Give that a try and let us know how you get on. These bearings are a precison fit on our silver steel shaft with very little tolerance.

Geoff, Stainless for that price! I'm afraid not.

Just wondering what the best options are for preventing rust for outdoor use. Would these suffice?

Geoff, Whilst these bearings have two shields (ZZ suffix on bearing number), water will still damage them. Bearings should be contained within say a rubber bush stuffed will a water repellent grease. However, stainless steel bearings are available, just not from us at this time although we are getting more requests for them.

Tim, No manufacturers value for thrust so should be kept to as low as possible otherwise the bearing will become tight and even stall. RPM is fine as bearing with oil is 43k rpm, grease is 36k rpm.