how long does a bearing seal half to leak to kill a wheel bearing?

bearing damage is generally instant. without proper lack of lubrication.

2 pints makes 1 quart. and i don't think the hub can hold half a pint.

you can also kiss the hub good bye. shops generally sell the whole setup. they no desire to pound the races out and new one in. they'd rather sell you a new hub rather then just a bearing and race.

course, if the bearing froze up. then it melted the race which spun around in the hub so the hub would be no good anyways.

 

If you still had that much oil I would think the bearings were what caused the seal to leak.

 

You ever seen one catch fire? Now what'd I do with that doggone picture...hmmmm
oh must've left it with the outrageous repair bill...ugh

 

Lucky the whole hub and wheel didnt come off! I've towed them in off the road like that

 

Front wheel bearing drive seal????? No pretrip or post trip If it is actually the front drive they hold close to 5 gallons of gear oil.It is hard to understand if you mean steering axle which would hold about a quart of gear oil. But by saying front wheel bearing drive seal it is hard to have an idea what you are talking about it would take aweek or more to lose that much oil out of a drive axle seal. Do you actually mean the seal or gasket, which are two different things?It did not happen in five minutes anyway,Driver Neglect. Sorry.

 

Pretty much til the oil is gone, some leak slow some go faster.
It's possible that a seal could blow in the middle of a 500 mile nonstop driving stretch and you could lose the bearing.

 

Better hope oil is not leaking on ur brakes...

 

if it's the inside axle seal. there's going to be oil on the brakes.

if it was the outside seal. he'd have oil all over the rim. and any scale would put him out of service on the spot.

 

Years ago I had an rear trailer axle almost catch fire. There was so much smoke and it came on fast. So I would get it fixed before it becomes a major problem. That's the whole point behind a pre-trip is to catch items like this so you don't have a huge safety problem. Also I had a axle that leaked oil onto to the brakes very slowly and no one noticed with in town driving. Not until I pulled the trailer down the grade into AZ from Las Vegas did I have problems. Just a lot of smoke and loss of brake application. It was a small leak and wasn't found until the drum was pulled. It just goes to show you something like this can go un-noticed and be a major problem. Pre-trips are very important to you and others.