Has anyone ever taken the new style spd’s appart to replace the ball bearings?

I’ve got a set of pd970’s that have a bit of play developing and I’m thinking about taking them apart but I think there are lots of bearings in there and I don’t know how well they would go back.

I think the XT, 540, 520 have the same internals.

Has anyone tried it?

520’s are straight forward and you should be able to get the manual from Shimano’s web site, 970’s are a similar design (from what I can tell from the shimano manuals) with higher quality parts and seals. Reallistically unless you’re wanting to do a complete strip and clean and its just the play that bothers you then remove the axle (with the SPD axle collar removal tool) and nip up the cone nuts on the end, pump the body full of grease and put it al back together, 10 minutes.

yup what he said, would be very finnicky to reassemble