Bustin' My Balls!   (Trashed wheel bearings)

Yesterday afternoon something felt not QUITE right. The road felt slightly rougher than it should, not the ride but the grindy texture. I thought I heard a squeal once when I stopped, and not like locked brakes (and it wasn't a quick stop). I felt it pull once as if I'd run over a rock, but no rock. Then around sunset as I was pulling in to home, It Happened.

A serious wobble, like a shudder, and a grinding sound from the rear, when I reached 20 mph.

With EXTREME caution, I rode the two miles home at 15 mph, blessed with traffic and speed limits where this was plausible. A little Internetting indicated that these symptoms fit what I had in mind: trashed wheel bearings. And a quick visual inspection confirmed this:

Busted Balls! Only two ball bearings left, and a warped piece of metal.

The nice black ring is gone. The metal ring is ragged and warped. And there are only two ball bearings, inside a lot of worn-down metal. Holy crap!


The bearing pack should look a lot like this one, on the right-hand side of that same wheel.

Good bearings. A nice plastic casing that twirls smoothly with a fingertip.

I pulled off the wheel to get a better look, and took these graphic photos. (viewer discretion is advised)

Busted balls, Batman! Two bearings and a lot of shaved metal.

Completely reamed! Beyond the bearing, the wheel has been ground down. That aluminum shouldn't be powder. :(

The shaft that houses the axle, is covered in aluminum dust.

Fortunately the price tag isn't too outrageous. $20 for a new pair of bearing packs (left and right) so I can do them both (if one dies, the other can't be far behind). $150 for a new wheel used off eBay.

I'm fortunate that last night's fiasco happened exactly as it did. The wobble started when I was doing 25 mph and only two miles from home. Traffic was light residential, I didn't catch flak for holding up traffic. And none of the repairs are beyond what I can manage, once the parts come in.

There's even a side benefit here. Now that I have the rear wheel off, I can take a critical look at my brake pads. And I'm really looking closely at the tire and finding that it's more bald than I like. And speaking of brake pads, how are the front ones anyway? So, on to some more checkups and maintenance.

A side question

I took my bike in for maintenance at the 30k mark two months ago, and have put on maybe 500 miles since then. Is this something that the mechanic should have noticed? Should they have been replaced just because of the mileage? Or does this Just Happen without anyone to blame?