The trip home from Middlebury

[Panhead]

Even when bad luck strikes I'm a lucky guy.

As you may have read in my other thread http://www.jaycoowners.com/showthrea...this-Wednesday I just spent a week at the Jayco plant having some structural repair work done. Well that all went pretty well but the trip home was not uneventful.

I left Middlebury at noon on Friday the 4th and headed west. The first leg of the trip was going great until about 10:30 that night in the middle of nowhere Nebraska. Actually I was about 30 miles west of Lincoln when a wheel bearing failed and the right rear wheel came off. (I did grease the bearings this spring as described in the owners manual). When the wheel came off it damaged the plastic "fender" and the sheet metal skirting behind the wheel. While I was on the side of the road a guy pulling a travel trailer stopped and asked if I lost a wheel, when I said yes he replied that he had found it and voila, I got the undamaged wheel and tire back.

Good Sam Roadside Assistance had the trailer towed to York Nebraska (about 15 miles further west) and was towed to the tow companies shop and arrived at about 1:30AM Saturday morning. The owner/tow truck driver said he'd be back at 9:00 am to fix the breaks and bearings. 9AM sharp he was there to do the work and fortunately he had the necessary Dexter parts in stock. He had me fixed and on the road by 10:30 am. I have since contacted Jayco about the problem and they are covering the failure under warranty and reimbursing the cost of the repair and fixing the body damage!

Unlucky........... Had the wheel come off and bearing fail.

Lucky...... Had the Good Sam Roadside Assistance and it worked as advertised.... got my money's worth there
Lucky...... Got a great tow company and driver (Mogul's in York NE) and took great care of the trailer.
Lucky...... Got the wheel and tire back and was able to use it again.
Lucky...... Had a great mechanic (Jeff Mogul) who was able to perform a quick and proper repair. (Thanks Jeff)
Lucky...... Bought a Jayco and they do indeed take care of their customers!!!!!!!!!!!!! Thanks Jayco.

Even with a few speed bumps along the way............... Life is good!

Steve

[Ela1948]

Certainly couldn't say that you had an uneventful trip!! All is well that ends well. Glad that you are still confident about Jayco!

[Larry G.]

Gotta watch those 'speed bumps'.

[norty1]

You may want to buy a lottery ticket while your lucky streak in still on!

[OnTheGo]

You're not lucky that it all happened. But, IMO you're lucky it happened in Nebraska. Good people there.

[Ela1948]

You had mentioned that you had greased the bearings this spring. Did you wash the bearing out to check for roughness or just add more grease?? Just curious!! Most bearings fail because of lack of grease. Occasionally you will get a failure due to a bad bearing that was missed during repacking.
I'm an old farm boy who has checked a lot of bearings due to age and neglect on farm implements. I've noticed over the years that there is a much higher bearing failure percentage since most manufacturing is done over seas. Years ago, Timkin was the primary maker of bearings. I don't remember ever replacing a bearing unless there was a lack of lubricant or water had got in the bearing. It's not at all uncommon now to find a "rough" bearing when they are cleaned. I'm not saying all bearings made over seas are bad. Just that there is a higher percentage of bearings that prematurely fail.