front axle bearing problems??

[sub88]

i was driving on the highway when the left hub started to sieze and the truck started to pull to the left. after a while longer the brakes went out to the point were floorin the brake pedal caused the truck to slow gradually.. a couple people have said the front axle bearings going bad will cause the symptoms i had. any advice and/or other places to look online would be great,

as a side note..when i replaced the hubs a couple of weeks before that, the left one was significantly dirtier then the right and there was a very small amount of water in it. i cleaned it out and re-greased (the new hub) really well before installing the new one.

chris

[gregory914]

I've never done a hub on my 97 Burb, but if it is the hub that siezed, could you have over tightened it?

The other thing it could be is the front brake caliper. If the slides weren't greased they could be binding up and that would also account for the loss of pedal. When it gets overheated the fluid can boil out of the caliper and you have little or no brakes.

And water in the hub means a bad or not installed properly seal whichcan eat up bearings real fast.

Good Luck!

[sub88]

Originally Posted by gregory914

I've never done a hub on my 97 Burb, but if it is the hub that siezed, could you have over tightened it?

The other thing it could be is the front brake caliper. If the slides weren't greased they could be binding up and that would also account for the loss of pedal. When it gets overheated the fluid can boil out of the caliper and you have little or no brakes.

And water in the hub means a bad or not installed properly seal whichcan eat up bearings real fast.

Good Luck!

One thing I forgot to include in the initial post was that the stub shaft in hub was loose when I installed the new hub. The left wheel was really hot when I pulled off the highway so i dont know if that was the brakes or whatever was going on inside the hub (or axle?). After taking it apart, I found the hub to be completly destroyed and part of the hub is still stuck on the shaft.
i think those may have been the original hubs so i dont know if the seal just went bad over time...

Thanks for the advice.
by the way its an '88 sub. 3/4 ton 4x4 5.7 lit.