The front and rear went out on my 14 SGS at about 15K. Was only a year old so they warrantied both. Traded the bike at about 27K so I don't know how long the replacements lasted. This I noticed some noise and vibration.

They just warrantied the front bearings on my 16 UC at 15K also. I had noticed some vibration and was waiting for my 15K service...but then noticed my front hub was covered in rusty looking dirt.

I ride in the rain and wash the bike regularly, but I never use a pressure washer. Although I suspect they use a pressure washer at the dealer when they do my service.

But that kind of makes me wonder. At what point are they going to tell me that it's "normal wear" and refuse to cover it under warranty. I have the extended warranty...so I'm guessing once the extended takes over.

 

I had thought that the All ***** replacement bearings were US-made. Now, I guess I was wrong about that.

Wonder if there's any Japanese-made bearings for these bikes? Canadian, maybe? Anything but Chinese.

 

I'm with you there!

 

........

 

I love to read here but rider complaints/failures don't meet any real world results on average. I wash my bike about twice a year and ride in the rain very seldom. I've never had a wheel bearing fail/go bad on any vehicle i've owned. With that being said i'll have them checked when i wear my tires out at about 20k rear on stock Dunlops.

 

I never had either, until I bought a Harley Davidson product. The first was a 2008 Buell Ulysses. they were so hard on rear wheel bearings that Harley redesigned the rear wheel in 2009 adding a third bearing and upping the bearing size significantly. The Buell originally used bearings in the rear wheel the same or similar in size to what they use in the new Touring models. Until I bought the redesigned wheel in 2010 I replaced the rear wheel bearings every 9000 miles when I put a new tire on...and they always needed replacing.

The reason for posting about these failures is so that folks like you will check their wheel bearings the next time they replace their tires.....

 

I just had new tires put on my '14 TK and found the front bearings rough with 41K and the dealer replaced them on my extended warranty.

 

I wonder how many, say, 2017 Cadillacs would be sold if GM couldn't design wheel bearings that would reliably outlast the tires that came on them?

I'd say not many. It's amazing just how much BS the MOCO gets away with year in and year out and still stays in business.

Roller and ball-type wheel bearings have been around since the days of steam locomotives and model A Fords- it ain't rocket science.

 

 

I had a '14 RK with a bad front wheel bearing right off the show room floor. I took it back three time stating there was a loud hum coming from the front end when i went into a corner. Dealer looked all three times and said they found nothing. Well i bought a set of 2016 SGS rims and tire to put on the RK, guess what, when they went to install them they called and said I needed new front bearings, this bike only had 4600 miles on it