No, they machine the wheel bearing races and put radial bearing in place. Very nice mod, I did it to my nose wheel. You don't have to do any maintenance to the bearing other than monitor them. They have very little rolling resistance too.
No, they machine the wheel bearing races and put radial bearing in place. Very nice mod, I did it to my nose wheel. You don't have to do any maintenance to the bearing other than monitor them. They have very little rolling resistance too.
I did the nose wheel mod from day one and it has been rock solid with never a shimmy. I personally feel that the drastically reduced rolling resistance on the nose gear is worth the mod.
I have not done the bearing mod to my mains and I did have a pretty wicked shimmy on my left main until I balanced the wheels. Like you said though, I will probably do the bearing mod to the mains at some point because maintaining the tapered bearings is a pain and messy.
As far as flying qualities/landing/taxiing goes I doubt there would be a tremendous difference in feel.
I bought a used nose wheel on eBay to have a spare. When I received it I found it to have the Antisplat modification done. I sent the wheel to Allen and had a new tire and tube installed and had it trued and balanced. I didn't have a shimmy problem on my 6A but installed the wheel anyway and noticed it was much smoother.