Bandit 3680 "The Beast" grinder axle hubs

[Tony Wells]

A heads up while on the road. Short story is I burned up the wheel bearings on all three axles AFTER selling this machine and ruined the axle stub ends on one of them. Of course, Axle Surgeon can fix me up, but apparently Bandit had special axles made. At least at this point it looks that way. Two of the hubs suffered from spun bearing races, and per Dexter, they are obsolete. I'm looking for a couple of them. Used is fine, or I'd like general opinion on metallizing or HVOF coating the race area and remachining for new bearings. I'll attach a pic of the ID tag on the axles. Later I'll add to the gallery of failures from the road. Open to ideas or suggestions. As I said, I'm on the road today so will have limited Internet access and opportunity, but if you care to comment please do. I'll catch it as soon as I can.

Thanks in advance!

t

 

[Tony Wells]

More pics. Apparently, our guys set up the wheel bearings incorrectly, the oil got hot enough to pop the caps off for a total loss of oil. This is a tri-axle setup, and the center axle is ruined on both sides, as are the hubs. The front and rear appear to have survived other than bearings and seals. I'm going to put fresh bearings and seals all around, but have not resolved the repair method for the center axle. The alignment shop that is working this tells me that Axle Surgeon can do their end, cutting/welding a new stub into the axle tube, but this supposedly is a short, nonstandard spindle so will have to make a couple special for this. I suppose the idea was to keep the machine as narrow as possible while keeping as wide a stance as they could. It uses zero-offset wheels, which show no damage.

I was thinking that it might be workable to find (in my wrecking yard) an axle that would fit those wheels and shorten it to get the OAL to match the other two. Provided I can get the c-c on the wheels to agree with what's there without running out of room up against the frame rails. At this point, I am willing to pay Axle Surgeon to do their thing, provided I can find a couple of hubs. If I can't, restoring the stubs to OEM really is no help. Still looking at building the hubs up and machining them back. The two from the center axle have been pretty warm, and understandably, my alignment guy is hesitant to go that way.

Anyway, open to ideas or sources. Or if someone knows of a 3680 that's being parted out, I'd be interested in knowing of it. Except the one in SC. That's where I've been. After a close look, and some other things, I had to pass.

 

[Tony Wells]

Of course on this one, the hub simply slipped off the stub. After the bearings failed, nothing was holding the hub. The wheel/tire was listing about 30 deg as the truck stopped on the Interstate shoulder. Basically fell off when jacked up.

 

[DMiller]

Chuck all but rims and tires, not going to salvage anything but later heartache off that. Best/fastest choice just buy a New replacement set up by dimensions and swing it. How did they screw up the bearing adjustment? That is a old standard set up.

 

[Tony Wells]

How? As the story unfolds, the techs were furnished incorrect bearings (per the supplier) and beyond that obviously failed to set the preload and/or check end play. Or some combination. We're still investigating. I can't explain it. Whatever they did, it was consistent on all 6 ends on 3 axles. The center failed worse, but the front and rear were not far behind.

I'm thinking to replace all three axles and be done with it. Problem I see so far is finding just what is so special about these, what and why did Bandit change to a custom axle. If I can find a standard axle that would sub, off the shelf, I'd likely do that.

 

[DMiller]

There is a sequence on Dexter axle bearings adjustment, listed in these pages.

https://www.dexteraxle.com/docs/def...duty-9-15k-(lit-123-00).pdf?sfvrsn=b8db1548_2

Other option, contact the supplier for known inventories:
https://www.dexteraxle.com/

 

[Tony Wells]

I apologize for never closing this case for you guys.

Bandit obsoleted this particular axle in 2010 according to my best information. Hence they keep no stock or parts (the kind I needed anyway) for this design. They now use 3x 25k axles in place of the 15K on my machine. Apparently, Dexter was building this slightly modified design just for Bandit, so they too were not able to provide any help, with a 4-5 week lead time to custom build replacements. I was able to locate a burnout machine (S.C.) that was being parted out and had 2 axles remaining. I drove across the country to look them over, and to make this a little shorter, ended up buying both. Meanwhile, the shop the machine was towed to was working on getting all the pieces together to rebuild all 3 axles. Fortunately, one was not damaged in all of this, so only the two salvage axles needed a lot of work. Everything seemed to be stop and start due to various factors, and one bit of damage required bringing in an Axle Doctor. We had consulted them earlier on doing their thing to both the original, ruined axles but were told the stubs were not in stock, and would have to be made. The lead time was not that good so we pursued the salvage axles, figuring they would be repairable or usable. As it happened, one of the bearing retainer nuts had pulled a thread and stripped/tore/galled the spindle threads, so we had to do something else. Turns out, the Axle Doctor who also happened to live in the same town as the shop working on the trailer was able to come up with 1(one) correct stub somehow. A few hours one morning and we were back on track. One last "gotcha" was found only when the wheels were being mounted. Several stripped lug studs. Fortunately again, they were not too special and the shop was able to order in and the decision was to replace all of them on one side of the two salvage axles. Once they arrived it was a matter of scattering the hub/brake drum assembly for pressing the studs in. So with all new hardware pretty much everywhere on all three axles, it was done. It took quite a while, longer than normal, but being a specialty machine and not a typical truck or trailer I guess that's to be expected. Somehow, the new owner was gracious and patient enough to allow us to work through several problems and get it done. I'm not quite sure I would have been as patient, but I am grateful.

So in the end, the machine has for all practical purposes, new axles all around, new brakes, bearings, seals, caps, etc., with replaced tires where needed. There were no further mishaps on the delivery run and it works in its new home and everyone is happy to close this chapter on this Bandit. So aptly named.