Any idea what causes this?

How often do you change or check your rear end oil that stuff looks horrible! Outside bearing failure on the first picture and as you stated nuts come off the other side! Same mechanic to both jobs or different!

 

It got water in it, bad seals or a cracked housing. Took a while but bearing(s) eventually failed.

 

The one time my entire tires, wheel and axle came out of it's axle housing was when the bearing ring itself was destroyed. Once you lose the bearing there isnt anything holding it on. The first turn you make the whole axle and tires set will start creeping towards the oncoming traffic (If it was the left side on a right turn)

The warning I did get of our bearing losses was a sudden lazy engine that needed another 150 to 200 RPM to maintain a gear. When you run farm routes every day when that truck is off just a little bit in the RPM anywhere you know somethings dragging. In this case it was dumping bearing races in crumpled little peices inside of the tires on the ground at the farm.

How did it get that bad? Who the hell knows. Bearings are replaced like once every 20 years or so.

 

It real simple you had a wheel seal leaking for a long time on both sides and finally ran low on oil and the bearings failed. The brake shoes are covered with oil. Also have the front diff wheel seals replaced now cause they are going to fail any day. Might add to change the oil to.

 

very poor maintenance. proper pretrip would have caught this long ago.

 

Lack of maintenance is why your wheels are falling off, plain and simple.

 

What an interesting sentence. Stated so calmly and matter-of-factly given the circumstances. I'm not exactly sure why I'm so fascinated at how this was worded. To a truck nerd like me it's almost like telling someone who just had a heart attack and still laying in the hospital bed "Lack of a proper diet and exercise is why you are about to die, plain and simple." Lol fascinating