What causes wheel bearing/hubs to fail?

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I left my house today to go to work and did not get even a mile down the road, heard a bad humming/roaring sound from the front end of my truck. The truck also seemed to be struggling to move, as if the brakes were stuck. I came back home, called in to work and put the front end up on jack stands. Left front wheel spins fine, no noise, very easy rotation. The right front has obvious wheel bearing noise. Rough scraping sound and the wheel did not move nearly as easily as the left front did. The wheel itself was also a lot hotter to the touch than the left wheel was. But there was no movement of the wheel. For now it is still tight to the hub, no play at all in or out, top or bottom or sideways. Caliper and pads are OK.

So I am pretty sure I have a bad wheel bearing hub assembly. I just replaced my OE hubs in November 2012. I used Duralast hubs and am now finding out they may not have been very good quality. I just now ordered two Moog hubs from AAP, used the TRT41 code, did two transactions and saved $80.00 on the pair.

I hope the Moogs will do better but I wonder what exactly caused such an early part failure like this? It has been only about 15,000 miles on the Duralast hubs, they should not have failed this soon. I have new tires and my alignment is perfect. Ball joints and all other suspension parts are OK, so is my steering. Is Duralast just bad quality or what? I did see the Driveworks brand at AAP and Duralast at Autozone both have the same part number so they both come from the same factory in China. I did drive in some heavy rain on Friday, did not drive the truck at all on Saturday or Sunday, and when I pulled the wheels this morning the right front hub-rotor had water on it. The left did not. Could water have gotten past the seals on the bearing and caused this?

I am replacing both hubs today even though the left *appears* to be OK for now. I do hope these Moogs will be the "problem solver" they claim to be. Man I hate Mondays..
 
Poor manufacturing or the manufacturer specified a wheel bearing that is too small for the application.

Dakotas are pretty (in)famous for front ball joints and wheel bearings not lasting long.

I went through a few sets quite quickly on my Cherokee. The Timkens lasted the least amount of time. Right now I am on the cheap advance auto ones and, surprisingly enough, they do quite well.
 
You used duralast hubs, probably of questionable foreign sourcing. That would be a guess. How much is the oe part vs autozone? Not all that is dealer and manufacturer profit.

Many smaller trucks have ballpoint and hub issues, especially if larger tires are used. Specs do come into play.

Sealing, grease, water ingress, etc also play here.

I don't know the details of your bearing/hub, but back in the day, heat and longevity issues could be caused by improper tightening of the nut, and lack of measurement of fractions of a degree of play.
 
It's a cheap hub. That's all there is to it. The bearing isn't as good as a more expensive hub. I went through 3 cheap hubs on my previous Buick before settling on a more expensive hub that lasted until I junked the car.
 
Imperfections in surface finish. Actually shipping cars by railroad or truck used to cause early failure, shippers use methods to prevent this now.

Here is more than you ever wanted to know:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_brinelling

Repacking the bearings can extend life, but almost no one does this now a days, what with the price of labor.

Yes, water WILL cause this!
 
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Bad parts from duralast is almost a 50/50 chance. Had a bad water pump, bad caliper, bad distributor, etc. I normally get from rockauto but in a pinch we had no choice but to buy duralast parts since most of the time, the discount auto stores didn't have any parts in stock....
 
For a unitized bearing and hub assembly to fail so quickly, I think it was probably a seal failure that allowed water to invade and corrode the bearing.
 
Cheap Chinese bearings mean cheap steel,cheap roller balls,cheap grease,and no tolderance standards.SKF,Timken or OE is the way to go.
 
Originally Posted By: NHGUY
Cheap Chinese bearings mean cheap steel,cheap roller balls,cheap grease,and no tolderance standards.SKF,Timken or OE is the way to go.


But a lot, not all, of these name brand bearings are also foriegn made. Can't win any more.
 
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Duralast... feh! Don't get me started. Aftermarket bearings in general took a real nosedive in quality in teh 90s, but Duralast seems especially bad.

My folks had a Dakota and a Dakota-based (first-gen) Durango. over 200k miles on each and never lost a hub bearing. Was the original changed as a preventative, or did it actually fail?
 
Originally Posted By: NHGUY
Cheap Chinese bearings mean cheap steel,cheap roller balls,cheap grease,and no tolderance standards.SKF,Timken or OE is the way to go.


I agree.

Obligatory:
AcCZAcu.jpg
 
As of yet I have not seen Koyo bearings being made anywhere but first-world countries. NTN neither, but I've only bought those once.

The F.A.G. (actually without the periods) bearings I bought for my BMW were made in the USA and Germany. I see that RA sells a F.A.G. bearing, if you email the company they will usually tell you the COO.

I my experience you can often tell the COO by the price. There will be Chinese bearings (ex. $45) and German, Japanese or US bearings ($110).
 
Originally Posted By: tig1
Originally Posted By: NHGUY
Cheap Chinese bearings mean cheap steel,cheap roller balls,cheap grease,and no tolderance standards.SKF,Timken or OE is the way to go.


But a lot, not all, of these name brand bearings are also foriegn made. Can't win any more.


This. I bought Timken at the recommendation of everyone else. Within a few months, one was loose (properly torqued when installed) and the other was humming.

Unfortunately, I was stupid, and didn't bother keeping the receipt because "they are timken and they will last".

Took a bath on that one.
 
Good bearings are not, and never have been easy nor cheap to make. FWD wheel hubs are in a relatively severe operating environment with environmental intrusion always a threat. They are subjected to sustained high-speed operation with frequent impact loading. All of this puts demands on the quality of construction.
 
Originally Posted By: zzyzzx
Originally Posted By: NHGUY
Cheap Chinese bearings mean cheap steel,cheap roller balls,cheap grease,and no tolderance standards.SKF,Timken or OE is the way to go.


I agree.

Obligatory:
AcCZAcu.jpg



Dayummmm! Who made that bearing?

But anyway, the best steel, the best assembly method, and the best grease aren't worth a thing if the seal fails.
 
I had the same problem with a Carquest hub on my truck, its caused my poor tolerances and quality control on the part of the bearing maker. Mine failed at 1 year right at the warranty period. I bought a Timken hub from Advanced which was $90 more and on the outside seemed of much higher quality.

Why replace both?
 
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Originally Posted By: kschachn
As of yet I have not seen Koyo bearings being made anywhere but first-world countries. NTN neither, but I've only bought those once.

The F.A.G. (actually without the periods) bearings I bought for my BMW were made in the USA and Germany. I see that RA sells a F.A.G. bearing, if you email the company they will usually tell you the COO.

I my experience you can often tell the COO by the price. There will be Chinese bearings (ex. $45) and German, Japanese or US bearings ($110).


The quality difference can be striking, I replaced some cheap Chinese bearings in a 300SD years ago with Made in Germany OE Mercedes bearings and just by looking at them you could tell they were worlds apart in quality. Of course you could buy three Chinese for the price of a German bearing.

I know of a lot of original German made bearings with well north of 300k on them that are tight, and I can't think of a cheapo that's lasted more than a year or two.

Heck my original GM hub and bearing assembly had 110k on it before it failed, the other three are at 130k and still original and fine.
 
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Long day today..I had to take the day off work but drive my wife to her job so I could use her car to get parts if needed. I told her I could ride my mountain bike to Napa or Advance but she wasn't having it. So I got back here, checked the prices online and bought two Moog hubs from Advance. I used the TRT41 discount code, did two separate transactions and saved $80.00 on the pair. My cost was $78.00 each plus the Moogs included a new spindle nut. I think the cheaper Napa hubs were around $72.00 each and on top of that you have to spend another $10.00 each for 2 spindle nuts so the AAP deal was well worth it.

When I removed the right front hub it was pretty clear what had happened, the outer surface of the bearing race was rusted and the bearing itself was very rough when I spun it by hand. With the hub on the spindle without the rotor and caliper/pads the hub had so much play in it that it was like a socket on a wobble drive extension. I could almost rotate the outer part with the wheel studs in a complete oval pattern. It was pretty obvious water must have got in the seals and ruined the bearings inside.

The left side was not near as bad as the right but I replaced them both anyway just for peace of mind. This was a lesson learned, cheap parts are cheap for a reason. Maybe the hubs failed because my alignment was off for a while last year. My steering wheel was straight so I did not notice the alignment problem until I had some tire cupping problems. Last summer I got new tires and a lifetime alignment deal at Firestone so I should not have any problems like that now.

I can say my truck is rolling smooth as glass now, no noise and no problems at all from the front end. I will also say buy a name brand part if you need suspension or steering parts. Those Duralast hubs were made in China and only had a one year warranty. The Moogs are made in Korea and have a three year warranty. That alone should explain this entire ordeal today.

Thanks for your replies here.
 
Originally Posted By: 440Magnum
My folks had a Dakota and a Dakota-based (first-gen) Durango. over 200k miles on each and never lost a hub bearing. Was the original changed as a preventative, or did it actually fail?



I replaced the OEM Mopar hubs some time in 2010 or 2011. They were making a bad roaring howling sound like they were about to fail. That had to be around 125,000 or 130,000 miles. I used National brand hubs on that replacement. They lasted until November 2012 when one of them really started howling and was making real bad grinding noises on left turns. So that was when I put on the Duralast hubs. It happened in November a day or two before Thanksgiving and I was on my way out of town. I was short on both money and time.

The Duralast hubs barely lasted 18 months and maybe 15,000 miles. I would say the Drive Works brand would probably be about the same since they have the same part numbers and probably are made from the same parts in the same factory in China.

I learned my lesson today though. I really do miss quality American made and other First World parts.
 
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