Jimny eats front wheel bearings

I was thinking that. Notwithstanding that your time is precious to you Martin, could it be worth fitting them yourself or by a respected fitter to rule out any fitting errors? I know it is not your problem as a supplier of the bearings to fit them correctly but either the car is damaged and won't be able to take new bearings without further repair or whoever is fitting these bearings is doing something quite wrong.

I would also be asking how is he installing them, Pressed in? or punched in using a drift and hammer? Does he understand which part of the race to put pressure on to push them in, rather than just beating them in with a misaligned drift on the center of the bearing. (sorry if i'm teaching the fellow to suck eggs)

You can't really apply too much preload without insane amounts of torque, as the preload is set by the split in the inner race closing up, then you'd have to compress the whole of the inner race.

It can only really be down to hammering them in, or pressing on the wrong part which dents the races- brinelling, or overheating them which anneals the bearing- you'd see the colour change and the wear marks. The failed bearings need careful examination.

It could be a manufacturing defect with the bearings, or some fakes may have got into the supply chain I suppose. If the bearings weren't hardened properly they'd wear in no time

Here is a nice article on bearing failure

www.schaeffler.com/remotemedien/media/_s...g_failures_us_en.pdf

I had the same issue with one side bearing. After a lot of search, it caused by crooked hub, also the abs light came on after 110kmh. After changing the hub both problems solved.

What is the history of the car with this owner? has he just got it or ran it for a fair amount of time before he replaced them and if so why did he replace them then?

I just got myself a 2017 Jb43 model. Got replaced my rear bearings 2 times (once in the dealer) in a week. Note that I barely go offroad and never even dipped my toe in mud or sticky situations yet. Just 10 or 20 miles on a regular dirt road kills my bearings. Also same is happening on the front axle. Never ever in my life have I encountered these bad-bearing issues. Just got canceled my second tour to countryside due to bearing issues again...