Beware Chinese bearings!

[mjncad]

These bearings came out of a friend of a friend of mine's '57 Chevy hot rod with an aftermarket front suspension kit. The following text is from my friend. Fortunately no one was hurt or worse and the car suffered minimal damage from this cheap junk.

Though difficult to tell in the picture, "China" is etched into the edge of the inner race on these bearings. Only 2900 miles logged on these. You can see how overheated the rollers are. When the cage dissolves between the rollers, not much can be done except replace.

 

[Kendall69]

Beware Chinese bearings!....and pet food, clothing with lead, toys with lead, Chinese-supplied wheat and rice gluten that had been adulterated with melamine, Baby cribs that collapse, tooth paste, and on and on.

 

[Killer_B]

And you don't even want to think about their nukes.

 

[BTI]

This should be a wake-up call for us to bring our manufacturing back home.

BTI

 

[Rara Avis]

Timken
the only ones to use...

 

[BlacknTan]

Beware Chinese bearings!....and pet food, clothing with lead, toys with lead, Chinese-supplied wheat and rice gluten that had been adulterated with melamine, Baby cribs that collapse, tooth paste, and on and on.

Took the words right outta' my mouth!

 

[Rara Avis]

Beware Chinese bearings!....and pet food, clothing with lead, toys with lead, Chinese-supplied wheat and rice gluten that had been adulterated with melamine, Baby cribs that collapse, tooth paste, and on and on.

Gee...could you imagine a whole tractor made of chinese parts...

I am now going to find my hardhat...

 

[Tig]

I'd suspect that it wasn't greased properly at the suspension assembly plant, where ever that was.
I've seen the same or similar things happen several times over the past 30 years. I learned a lesson about greasing new parts when I was a kid and bought parts from a place we call "crappy tire" I haven't bought anything from them in 15 years but I still take time to make sure I grease what can be greased when I buy a vehicle or parts.

 

[SnowRidge]

Without a lot more info, it's impossible to know if the bearings were bad from the get-go, or there was some external factor that led to their early demise.

For better or worse, a lot of OEMs are using Chinese bearings these days.

 

[Tig]

Just had another look at the damaged bearing pic. Is that rust I see on the inner race?