WHEEL BEARING UNIT

The invention relates to a wheel bearing unit including a wheel hub. The wheel hub has an integrally formed wheel flange at one end and an inner ring which can be rotated together with the wheel hub. The inner ring is secured on the wheel hub by a rolling rivet connection in order to pretension a row of rolling elements relative to an outer ring. The wheel bearing unit also has an encoder, which is provided on the inner ring and extends radially in the direction of the outer ring, and a protective cover which is secured to the outer ring in order to close and seal annular openings that are formed between the outer ring and the wheel hub. A cylindrical mounting section of the protective cover is pressed into a cylindrical press-in portion of the outer ring, and a shielding section extends from the cylindrical assembly portion inwards in a radial direction (R1). A base section is provided which adjoins the shielding section in order to cover an inner-side end of the wheel hub, and a sealing element is provided on a circumferential surface, which faces away from the outer ring, of the cylindrical assembly portion. The sealing element is formed such that a part of the sealing element protrudes from the mounting section in the axial direction (R2) in order to form a sealing lip which is pressed axially onto a section of the outer ring in order to sealingly rest against this section.