2004 Boxer Front Wheel Bearings

My love of the Spanish mountains has got me into deep trouble.

Too many steep descents with foot on brake has "cooked" the front pads with the O/Side running so hot, it melted the wheel trim in places, this in turn has buggered the wheel bearing.

Main Peugeot dealers say they've had this problem before with Boxer vans, the hub gets so hot that the bearing gets almost welded in & even with a 30 ton press is impossible to separate the bearing from the hub & the housing.

If this is the case with mine & they can't separate, they say I'm looking at about £1000 for new parts & labour.

Anyone out there had experience with this problem? are they trying to have me over?

Having a quick look on Ebay shows second-hand complete hub assemblies at between £50 and £90 plus new bearings. New hubs alone are around £90 each if the rest of your swivels etc are usable. So I think £1000 is rather OTT.

mikemelson wrote:..... running so hot, it melted the wheel trim in places....

One of the first things I did was ditch the original AS-fitted wheel trims. In my view they excessively restricted the air flow through the slots in the wheel and around the discs. First time out over the first cattle grid the two on the rear flew-off anyway!

We've had some pretty hot descents over the years but, at moderate speeds, the brakes never cooked. In fact after 50k miles there was very little wear on the front pads. On my first generation front discs (unventilated) they did smell a bit and I did go through a phase of throwing water on them occasionally. I know this risked quenching them but I never induced any distortion so I assume it did no harm. With the mk2 ventilated discs they've never got as hot.

I have to say, when you see the amount of metal in the front hubs, I'm very surprised that heat from the discs would conduct or radiate onto the hubs and cause the whole thing to get so hot as to cause bearing damage. I'd suspect this to be a bit of 'dealer mythology' personally.

Sorry to say, my Mk1 front suspension went to the scrap man.

Bartfarst

Hi Mikemelson,   I think you may be lucky.At that temperature you will get brake fade.
You could easily have an accident.
You must stop if necessary on steep decents.Your brakes will smell long before melting takes place.                                I would take this as a warning and be more careful in the future.regards

Mike