front axle problems

[stewy1984]

Hello, have been to local pay and break it place today, on the way home, go to pull out of a junction and theres no drive at all....
(had been smelling gear oil for 20mins before hand)

so manage to get it clean of road, and notice one the cover off the passenger side half shaft is missing and the end of the shaft is so hot you could cok an egg on it.

anyway 6 hours later i finally get it recoverd home, having to drive it in diff lock to park etc.. and it looks like the wheel is about to fall off?

my guess would be the bearing as they needed doing for awhile, but would this cause the problems?

[Range Rover Blues]

High, I'm guessing you hae the ABS style axles with driveshaft and separate drive member, or did have.

With this style of axle the CV joint is secured to the drive member with a circlip to prevent the cv flaoting around in it's own bearing, there is no bearing behind the cv to do this unlike on the older style RRC axle.

If the bearing were to collapse then the circlip would be under a lot of pressure trying to hold the hub in place, I'd expect the circlip to fail.

Wuite why the drive member failed I'm not sure, but you need to be checking the hub/bearings and the stub axle inside and out plus the CV joint and halfshaft for damage.  When rebuilding you will need to check the endfloat on the hub then the endfloat on the CV to drive member, it's controlled by shims under the circlip.

[stewy1984]

yeah its the circlip type, the shaft was still spinning freely. So can you just undo the drive flange and pull the whole half shaft out?

cheers

[stewy1984]

Well heres the problem  :(

[Budgie]

OOOOH, that's a bit of a mess.

You'll have to strip the hub off to check the wheel bearings, I think I would replace them anyway looking at the heat that's been in there, so the brake calliper will have to come off. You can leave the brake line attached, just secure the calliper so there is no strain on the brake line.
 
Then undo the bolts holding the stub axle and remove that. You will now be able to see the CV and this should just pull out with the halfshaft attached.

Check the condition of the stub axle, looking at the wheelbearing surface on the outside & the roller bearings on the inside.
Also check the first bearing surface after the CV on the halfshaft as there is a bearing in the swivel housing that this runs on and that may need replacing as well.

[Range Rover Blues]

That'l need a new stub axle, the CV joint outer end has worn away on the inside of the stub axle so I'd expect it to be as badly damaged plus the CV joint bearing will almost certainly be goosed.

And you obvioulsy need the CV joint too.

[stewy1984]

cheers for the replies.

took the caliper off, and the hole disc/wheel hub fell off. left with a shaft with melted bearing remains and the big nut stuck on  :lol: hopefully my mate is coming over tonight with a spare stub axle, so we should be able to make something good out of the 2. my swivels are really good. so just need to find a new half shaft.

been meaning to do the bearing for weeks, bought them months ago, DOh that'll teach me to stop being lazy with the maintenance.

[stewy1984]

[GreedyGibson]

oooops 

[Range Rover Blues]

The swivle won't be effected by this, just the stub axle.

When you remove it though be careful and check that none of the female thread comes out of the swivel with the stub axle bolts, if it does the swivel is scrap unless you get it helicoiled.

[stewy1984]

everything seems fine, got new CV today. waiting on stub axle coming tonight, then swapping all onto abetter condition axle casting.

[stewy1984]

well i'm still at it lol. got new casting on and back on car. didnt get a stub axle, also found i needed to new wheel hubs.

so managed to get 2 complete axle ends and a box of spare shafts for a bargin price. so its nearly done  :|

[python]

hope it all goes well for you, look's a nightmare.  8-[