The Saga Continues...
Oh... Tiffeeeeeee???!!! You ready to compare again?
So earlier this spring... I spared you all the details of one of my major breakdowns, but guess what... now you get to hear about them. Why now you ask? Well... we'll get to that in due course...
We were driving along and something just didn't feel right on the pickup. As we needed it to feed the minions... we were quite concerned with why things weren't Hoyle. As we go to one of our haystacks... I noticed the rear duals were smoking. Not being a smoker myself, I could quickly see this as a problem so I crawled in under the pickup to see what I could see. Turns out, the brake disk was hot... very hot. Not only that, but it appeared as if the brake pads weren't releasing and that was the reason for the heat. Not a good thing...
We got home and I quickly jacked things up and took a good look... to make a short story long... over the next two weeks, I replaced the brake pads and worked things over no less than 4 times, but I still could never seem to get it fixed.
Turns out, it wasn't the brakes at all, no... it was the bearing in the hub that had given way and allowed the hub to tilt ever so slightly and jam up on the brake calipers. To add to the confusion... the rear axle is tied to the hub in such a way as to keep it from really tilting and letting me know just exactly what the problem was until the axle broke and the whole hub then leaned in at about a 30 degree angle. The fix? By that time we were down to buy a whole new rear end.
So I callz the part store and we found 1 in the whole nation. ONE!!! It was in Houston and 20 days later... I finally got it.
I jumped on my little hoe, lifted the entire rear end of the pickup up, removed the old, and replaced it with the new, or in proper terminology... rebuilt rear end.
Fast forward to yesterday when I drove up to cut some hay about 25 miles away and when I got out... saw my rear wheels smoking again. But the driver's wheels had learned their lesson... this time it was on the passenger side. Needless to say... I've been to that rodeo before so I limped up to a cousin's place to try to find a ride back home. The whole day was consumed with me getting a trailer and driving up and hauling my other pickup back here.
This morning I disassembled the hub thinking that they'd put substandard bearings into the rear end and the bearings had failed only find that the entire spindle had broken in two. In case you were wondering... that's not a good thing. The spindle is the end of the axle housing that actually holds the hub (where the wheels bolt on) to the vehicle. Without that... the hub doesn't stay on, the wheels don't work, the pickup is useless.
A thorough inspection of the broken end piece revealed the real problem. Somebody, probably down at a "rebuilding" place in Houston, welded a broken spindle back together and then reassembled it and sold it as a rebuilt rear end. The only problem is that they were... well... let's just say shitty welders to be nice. The weld was full of air pockets, no bonding to the base metal at all, it was just a time bomb waiting to go off.
So off to town I went. Back to the parts house, call to Houston, "we'll look it up and call you back", haven't heard back yet (called at 10 this morning, it's about 7 p.m. now), all the local machinists were out of town so I don't even know if it can be fixed, and now I'm down one pickup which I use for just about everything important.
The good news is... I'm not even mad or discouraged. The beginning of the week went well and this is just one more thing to work around so we'll see how things turn out. Just par for the course... albeit a long par...
So with that, one can hope that September turns out a little bit... well... better.
If not... I'll have to go back to blaming Tiff.
***************************
Today's mystery lyric: (Remember the rules folks, no online searching of the lyrics, if you don't know it, you don't have the answer!)
I'll be a dandy, and I'll be a rover
You'll know who I am by the songs that I sing
I'll feast at your table, I'll sleep in your clover
Who cares what the morrow shall bring
Answer to last lyric: Somebody That I Used to Know by Gotye. Catchy song, but these guys have a great take. Watch it...
So earlier this spring... I spared you all the details of one of my major breakdowns, but guess what... now you get to hear about them. Why now you ask? Well... we'll get to that in due course...
We were driving along and something just didn't feel right on the pickup. As we needed it to feed the minions... we were quite concerned with why things weren't Hoyle. As we go to one of our haystacks... I noticed the rear duals were smoking. Not being a smoker myself, I could quickly see this as a problem so I crawled in under the pickup to see what I could see. Turns out, the brake disk was hot... very hot. Not only that, but it appeared as if the brake pads weren't releasing and that was the reason for the heat. Not a good thing...
We got home and I quickly jacked things up and took a good look... to make a short story long... over the next two weeks, I replaced the brake pads and worked things over no less than 4 times, but I still could never seem to get it fixed.
Turns out, it wasn't the brakes at all, no... it was the bearing in the hub that had given way and allowed the hub to tilt ever so slightly and jam up on the brake calipers. To add to the confusion... the rear axle is tied to the hub in such a way as to keep it from really tilting and letting me know just exactly what the problem was until the axle broke and the whole hub then leaned in at about a 30 degree angle. The fix? By that time we were down to buy a whole new rear end.
So I callz the part store and we found 1 in the whole nation. ONE!!! It was in Houston and 20 days later... I finally got it.
I jumped on my little hoe, lifted the entire rear end of the pickup up, removed the old, and replaced it with the new, or in proper terminology... rebuilt rear end.
Fast forward to yesterday when I drove up to cut some hay about 25 miles away and when I got out... saw my rear wheels smoking again. But the driver's wheels had learned their lesson... this time it was on the passenger side. Needless to say... I've been to that rodeo before so I limped up to a cousin's place to try to find a ride back home. The whole day was consumed with me getting a trailer and driving up and hauling my other pickup back here.
This morning I disassembled the hub thinking that they'd put substandard bearings into the rear end and the bearings had failed only find that the entire spindle had broken in two. In case you were wondering... that's not a good thing. The spindle is the end of the axle housing that actually holds the hub (where the wheels bolt on) to the vehicle. Without that... the hub doesn't stay on, the wheels don't work, the pickup is useless.
A thorough inspection of the broken end piece revealed the real problem. Somebody, probably down at a "rebuilding" place in Houston, welded a broken spindle back together and then reassembled it and sold it as a rebuilt rear end. The only problem is that they were... well... let's just say shitty welders to be nice. The weld was full of air pockets, no bonding to the base metal at all, it was just a time bomb waiting to go off.
So off to town I went. Back to the parts house, call to Houston, "we'll look it up and call you back", haven't heard back yet (called at 10 this morning, it's about 7 p.m. now), all the local machinists were out of town so I don't even know if it can be fixed, and now I'm down one pickup which I use for just about everything important.
The good news is... I'm not even mad or discouraged. The beginning of the week went well and this is just one more thing to work around so we'll see how things turn out. Just par for the course... albeit a long par...
So with that, one can hope that September turns out a little bit... well... better.
If not... I'll have to go back to blaming Tiff.
***************************
Today's mystery lyric: (Remember the rules folks, no online searching of the lyrics, if you don't know it, you don't have the answer!)
I'll be a dandy, and I'll be a rover
You'll know who I am by the songs that I sing
I'll feast at your table, I'll sleep in your clover
Who cares what the morrow shall bring
Answer to last lyric: Somebody That I Used to Know by Gotye. Catchy song, but these guys have a great take. Watch it...
posted by LL at 6:44 PM
6 Comments:
Sorry to read about the rear axle calamities.
I would never have guessed that a rear hub bearing would do that. I mean, end up tilting in such a way as to foul the brake calipers.
Hopefully, you've got it all sorted out by now, and you're able to get on with things.
No... not quite Madre... still waiting for the parts to arrive, and by parts I mean a brand new housing. We decided there was no sense in risking something used. We tried that and look where it got me...
Well, lets hope it goes well for you.
I suppose, you'll be assembling the parts yourself. I mean, you seem to have a good handle on what's going on back there.
For me, it's been a while since I've done any real grease monkeying around. I used to work as a diesel fitter back in the 80's (20th c.) on those now ancient 2.5, FX4, FX4R & FX4S diesel engines. Though most peeps back then called them black taxi cabs.
...Ah, those were the (filthy) days.
That's the advantage of being broke...
You get to do everything yourself.
Dang! Sure hope it's been fixed by now. Life in the wild is so demanding.
That it is Tiffy... that it is.
Post a Comment
<< Home