Mystery bolt in the passenger side half shaft assembly - 1995 LEsedan, 4-cyl

According to the free repair guide on Autozone, that should be the
bearing lock bolt on the bottom side that holds the bearing in the
holder. After you remove it, the snap ring holds the halfshaft at the
holder.

See excerpt below:

14. Remove the right halfshaft from the transaxle as follows:
1. Remove the bearing lockbolt. The lockbolt is located in the
center of the halfshaft, near the dampener.
2. Using snapring pliers, remove the snapring and pull the
halfshaft from the transaxle.

On Jul 26, 9:34 pm, "Pszemol" <Psze...@PolBox.com> wrote:
> I found a small bolt which seems to do nothing in its place...
>
> Passenger side half shaft, the longer one, has a bearing.
> The bearing is secured in the bearing mount with a snap ring.
> On the bottom side of the bearing mount there is a bolt,
> maybe 15mm hex head and 1/2" maybe 3/8" long, which
> screws up into the bearing mount, but it is too short to touch
> it the bearing itself. When I removed the shaft and its bearing
> and feel the place where the bolt was expected to stick out
> I could feel a deep hole, so the bolt was far, far to short to
> make any contact with the bearing...
>
> What is this bolt for? Is this some kind of grease point or what?

On Jul 27, 2:34 pm, "Pszemol" <Psze...@PolBox.com> wrote:
> I found a small bolt which seems to do nothing in its place...
>
> Passenger side half shaft, the longer one, has a bearing.
> The bearing is secured in the bearing mount with a snap ring.
> On the bottom side of the bearing mount there is a bolt,
> maybe 15mm hex head and 1/2" maybe 3/8" long, which
> screws up into the bearing mount, but it is too short to touch
> it the bearing itself. When I removed the shaft and its bearing
> and feel the place where the bolt was expected to stick out
> I could feel a deep hole, so the bolt was far, far to short to
> make any contact with the bearing...
>
> What is this bolt for? Is this some kind of grease point or what?

Immense confusion!!

I am surprised the Toyota guy knew nooooothing.

Not a grease point, no. It is a friction bolt designed to stop the
outer race of the bearing spinning along with the inner race on the
half-shaft. It doesn't really retain the bearing as such but does
support it in the housing, which is halfway along the shaft. At the
end of the bolt in the housing there is a plastic plug which bears
onto the bearing outer race and that should be in there, so check.

All very mechanically crafty, so make sure you replace it OK

Cheers