Close Call

[DJT]

Reversing my car into my garage involves a full right lock manoeuvre and lately I have been aware of a strange noise emanating from the front left wheel area whilst doing this. Today it got really bad, as if the brake pads that side were locking on. A close look with the steering hard over revealed the tyre wall rubbing against the spring base. Normally there is about 10mm clearance.

I jacked the wheel up and the whole wheel seemed loose, as if a wheel bearing had collapsed. Luckily I had a pair of front hub assemblies on the shelf which I had reconditioned at the start of lockdown, so I started to dismantle the front hub on the car.

This is what I found when it was apart. To think that I was doing 70 along the A38/M5 yesterday.....

EC14DA53-141F-4EF8-8964-5BDA81E4C04E.jpeg

[022Dave]

Not good! What sort of mileage had they done? I believe that most instances occur during low-speed manoeuvring, but nothing's to say it couldn't happen at higher speeds.

Count yourself lucky, mate, and buy yourself a lottery ticket

Other Dave

[DJT]

As far as I know, Dave, they are original, so have done nearly 114,000 miles.

This sort of thing worries me when I read of owners wanting to put big fat wheels and tyres on 40+ year old running gear that wasn’t designed to take them.

Dunno about a lottery ticket. My next purchase will be new front stub axles, etc. to build up another pair of hub assemblies for fitting to the car sometime soon.

[new to this]

Dave

you were lucky there,when you buy a new stub axle ,will you go for an original or uprated, uprated meaning you can use the same size wheel bearing front and back

Dave

[DJT]

Haven’t decided yet, Dave. Looking at the ones from Chris Witor at the moment, which are as per the original, but made from better steel.

[mole42]

This sort of thing worries me when I read of owners wanting to put big fat wheels and tyres on 40+ year old running gear that wasn’t designed to take them.

I couldn’t agree more. In fact I had a dream last night where I was driving my Stag very fast on a motorway and the steering failed. As in no connection between the steering wheel and the direction the front wheels pointed. I woke in a bit of a panic.

Richard

[KOY 23]

Wow Dave that was lucky!!
I think Chris Witor is the best supplier for suspension parts.

[flying farmer]

That was just a lucky escape!
I have heard plenty about rear hubs collapsing but very little about front stub axles

[Seaking]

Glad that when it happens if was at low speed . Thank you for posting Dave .

Cheers Glenn

[DJT]

Got a couple of these on order: https://www.chriswitor.com/proddetail.php?prod=138425RM, plus a few other bits ‘n bobs.

I had a rear hub let go at 60mph on my old Stag about 18 years ago. Makes you aware that many of the safety critical parts on these cars are way past the designed life span.

[022Dave]

Got a couple of these on order: https://www.chriswitor.com/proddetail.php?prod=138425RM, plus a few other bits ‘n bobs.

I had a rear hub let go at 60mph on my old Stag about 18 years ago. Makes you aware that many of the safety critical parts on these cars are way past the designed life span.

When I had my car restored some 16 years ago, I fitted new front stubbies, as a matter of safety. It was hearing scary stories such as yours that I've now upgraded to CDD front & rear hubs. There's an article in this months magazine about a rear hub letting go, so not an uncommon failure.

Bought your lottery ticket yet??

[new to this]

When i replaced the stub axles on the sprint , had to put them under a press they went with a bang

[DJT]

Just looked back through my records and this hub actually came from my first Stag. It was cleaned up, new bearings and disc, and fitted to this car after the 2013 body refurb. In which case it is possible that it has done over 200,000 miles - 190,000 on the first Stag and over 20,000 on this one. The RH one has the same history......

[Motorsport Micky]

When I had my car restored some 16 years ago, I fitted new front stubbies, as a matter of safety. It was hearing scary stories such as yours that I've now upgraded to CDD front & rear hubs. There's an article in this months magazine about a rear hub letting go, so not an uncommon failure.

Bought your lottery ticket yet??

This forum has highlighted these rear hub and stub failures before and reports can also be found in the TR Forum and the big saloon forum also, the one common denominator between them all is...these parts are dying.
As you may expect the TR forum has rather more instances where driving them like Jehovah (ie: furiously) and sports cars (sometimes with wider wheels and sticky tyres) accelerates the loads and shows like Christmas future in Dickens where Stags and other cars will end up further down the road.
The parts are far beyond whatever lifecycle was designed (was there one, ? other than "that shouldn't break") and certainly if todays design engineers from BMW, Jaguar, Aston et al were questioned about their cars and parts having a 40 or 50 year life expectancy they would think "you are aving a laff " !.
If you are unlucky your hubs may already have been treated to a new set of bearings sometimes in the last 20 years where the method employed to split the hub tapers was generous warming with a gas torch and then the smoking remains straight into the 20 ton press with a generous helping of "come off you b**tard" to get the hubs back into component parts. If it didn't buckle the hub faces the hidden danger was a stress crack hidden where non destructive testing couldn't show it (if any was employed) until when once again rebuilt into a complete unit the compromised components await your application of now destructive testing to highlight where that crack is. If you buy any reconditioned hubs it's very possible this is what awaits you, fit new hubs complete front and rear, they'll come with new stub axles.

Micky

[Phil S]

I have fitted the updated ones from cdd when the 4 pots went on