I have an 010 Ford Flex. It has 36k miles and bought it a yr ago with 24k miles. I have had 2 or 3 wheel bearing replaced earlier this Summer and one of the replacements already went bad and was replaced yesterday. This makes the count 4 now
Anyone else having bearing troubles.
I say 2 or 3 because they had to get 3 of them. i am not sure that they replaced 3 of the bearings or if two were replaced and one of the replacements were bad and had to be reordered. I smell inferior parts. Love the Flex but am afraid the bearings issue will reoccur.
AWD ? I See A Bulletin For 2010 Vehicles, Including Flex, That Exibit A Shudder/Chatter/Vibration. However, It Discusses Replacement Of The PTU (Power Transfer Unit).
Unlike most wheel bearing problems the PTU problems occur under 40 mph, driving uphill, or under heavy acceleration.
What are your symptoms and who is diagnosing these bearings ?
Rims are standard OE. I drive under normal conditions and on normal road surfaces. I heard the wirrr of the bearings as they start to wear out. I have faith in the local Ford garage that has handled the problem. They have a good rep and have handled the issue well so I hesitate to blame them for this.
Thanks for your help. As far as the TSB. The whirr is constant when the bearing is going out and stops when repaired. No shudder chatter or vibrations felt in take off or in steering. Just the whirr
Thak you Ken. I have asked about this at my local dealership and they did not find any TSBs or notices. We have discussed that the car was leased prior to my purchase so who knows what it’s history was. Carfax was clean.
Never put all of your faith into Carfax or AutoChek reports. They’re often incomplete or wrong.
You bought the vehicle with 24k miles on it so let me pose the following for consideration assuming the bearings were legitimately bad.
Water or moisture can kill wheel bearings very quickly. The obvious would be flood waters of course.
Another possibility is if someone had a history of driving into deep rainwater runoff. You’ve no doubt seen TV news blurbs during severe weather where drivers are shown plowing through foot deep, or deeper, water.
Heat attracts moisture and wheel bearings run very hot. When someone drives off into deep water moisture can easily ooze into the wheel bearings. This degrades the grease and eventually the bearing will fail.
Bottom line is that any wheel bearing issue was probably caused by something due to the prior owner rather this being a manufacturing defect.
Bearing designs can be poor. Subaru has had a long spotty history of bearings that don’t cut it. I am unclear why some models have issues and others do not.
I lucked out with my really specific model 2005-2006 Legacy/Outback turbo had a common enough failure in rear bearings that Subaru revised the part and extended warranty on them to 8yrs/100k miles. Mine failed at 99k miles
You may find Ford revising them soon. This model is an all new design and Ford is figuring it out. This happens across ALL makes with new designs.
Merely one response from Flushing Mich on the nationwide Ford dealer discussion board.
However, the part number is being superceded and that’s an indication of changes being made within.
old part # 8A8Z-1104-B
new part # BT4Z-1104-B
Which number hub/bearing did they put on yours ?
They put the “new part” on a rear wheel Hope this is the end of it. I was concerned that this was a common problem that I needed to make an issue. I want to see what happens next before I get excited
I appreciate the help and hope there are many happy, safe miles ahead for you all.
