Catastrophic Wheel Bearing Failure!!!

[cosmo727]

Hello Delica Die Hards

I recently had a catastrophic wheel bearing failure and I would like to share my story.

I was driving along fat, dumb, and happy when all of a sudden a felt a clunk and a shudder. I pulled over to have a look and didn't see anything obvious. I continued slowly on my way to work. Approximately 30 km later the wheel bearing on the left front side let go, seizing up the wheel and left me on the side of the road. I was only ten minutes from work. $80 for a tow and one hour later I arrived at work late.

I borrowed my friend's car to go home to grab a jack and tools to see what went wrong. Sure enough the wheel was moving when I jacked it up and grabbed it at 12:00 and 6:00 and started shaking it. I took it apart as much as I could with what I had. The outer wheel bearing disintegrated and seized everything up.

I was working night shift ( hate night shift!!! ) , finished in the morning and got the wife to pick me up. I was half way home when I got a call from a co-worker telling me that he had a CAA Gold Membership and I got it towed home. Thanks CAA Gold Membership co-worker!!!

After I finally got some sleep, I proceed to tear things apart. The wheel bearing was seized so bad that I was unable to get the rotor and hub assy off of the spindle of the knuckle. The knuckle and hub assy are destroyed!! There is also some other collateral damage as well. I now have everything apart so that I can go ahead and order parts. Don't ask how much this is going to cost me, it's a s*%t tonne of money!!!

I figure since I have everything apart I might as well replace the upper and lower ball joints and tie rod ends and the wheel bearings on the other side.

Lesson learned....check your front end on a regular basis...maybe every oil change or whatever interval you think is best. I think I was oblivious to the wheel bearing warning noise because of my 31" mud tire road noise ( no excuse ).

Cheers

I forgot to mention...I had just finished a camper mod and was supposed to go on my maiden camping voyage the next day!!! I'm looking on the bright side though...someone always has it worse than me. Also a bit of irony...I had good intentions to replace the wheel bearings as a precaution after the camping trip...they were sitting on the work bench in the garage all ready to go.

Cheers again

[ynwa]

Hey! Toss 'Falco' a message. Apparently all our bearings cross ref to a Dodge Raider? That would be Hella cheaper than Mitsu I rekon. Worth a look if you still have some time. Check http://www.delica.ca/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=17736.

Cheers.

[cosmo727]

Thanks, but I already have the bearings. They were sitting on my work bench ready to be replaced after my camping trip next week. I had good intentions and bad luck.

[Growlerbearnz]

Damn! That's nasty. And it's wrecked the hub and spindle too?

Hope you can get it fixed quickly. In the meantime, I imagine you'll change the bearings on the other side, because they're probably the same age as the failed one.

[cosmo727]

Yup, both hub and spindle wrecked. As for the bearings on the other side, damn right I am going to replace them.

[FalcoColumbarius]

Best deal is through Amayama. Bearings at Mitsubishi Canada are $70 ea and retainers are $50 ea. Through Amayama the more expensive OEM bearings from Japan are $27 ea and the Retainers are $18 ea. Mine arrived within a week of ordering them.

Check out "Useful Links for Vehicle Part Identification Purposes" in the Delica FAQ Section.

Falco.

[cosmo727]

Finally got " The Happy Wanderer" back on her wheels!!!!

Off to the alignment shop on Thursday and hopefully camping in the next week or so.

Here is the list of stuff replaced:

1] used hub from Rising Sun (destroyed)
2] used knuckle from Rising Sun (destroyed)
3] two new rotors (one destroyed)
4] upper ball joints (they were starting to go)
5] lower ball joints (just because everything was apart)
6] tie rod ends (just because everything was apart)
7] wheel bearings (both sides)
8] spindle bearings (just because everything was apart)
9] spindle nut and tab washer (destroyed)
10] manual locking hub (destroyed)
11] miscellaneous hardware

Cheers and Happy Travels