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BMW 3-Series (E90 E92) Forum > E90 / E92 / E93 3-series Technical Forums > All-Wheel-Drive (Xi / xDrive) Talk > Front Axels Broken



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      08-21-2014, 11:31 PM   #1
Amini77
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Front Axels Broken

A little more than a year ago I hit a pothole that destroyed my front right axel and slightly bent my rim. I had it replaced with a OEM Rebuilt Axel by BMW and it drove fine until last week. The car started making a knocking noise. I drove it around a little to see what it was and I figured out it only happens upon acceleration. I took the 4x4 fuse out, the noise stopped, so it had to be the axel. I had it towed to my mechanic and the newly replaced axel fell apart from the inside. Since it wasn't so long ago that I got the axel replaced, it was replaced again free of charge. I got my car back and went on the freeway and the knocking noise now turned into the entire car shaking. It turns out the distributor sent out the wrong size which happened to be 5mm shorter than the original axel. This caused the axel joint to pop out. The shop immediately ordered a new axel and made sure it was the right size. I also found that the front right spacer has sort of fell apart around the hub, is this because of the violent shaking? They put the axel in and it drove fine for a couple days. Few days later the same knocking and slight shaking came back, however this time it was barely noticeable. While I was driving I drove over a small bump around 30mph and the car started violently shaking again. It felt like the axel has popped out of its joint again so I had it towed back to the shop and they said its the FRONT LEFT AXEL thats toast. I also ran an OBD scanner before this happened and code P0700 popped up which is basically transmission limp mode.

I'm completely lost because the FRONT LEFT axel never saw damage from the pothole last year and has been perfect up until now. There was no problem with it ever. Can anyone explain to me what the hell is going on with my car? Could it be that while the wrong axel (which was 5mm short that I drove on for 15 minutes) was on could have caused damage to the front left axel since the car is out of a harmonic rotation I guess? He says the boot is all torn up. How do you explain the transmission code? A light didn't pop up on my instrument panel however it did show up on the OBD scanner. I trust my mechanic completely but I want a second opinion.

I know this is the least of concerns but could the front right axel have caused damage to the spacers too or is that because of the slightly bent wheel?

Update:

I just spoke with him over the phone he says the inner CV boot has been torn for a while now and this is true because we'd always find grease leaking from somewhere. He said since there was minimal grease and under a lot of load (like that bump I went over) it gave out and shredded the boot apart. As for the spacers, turns out both front spacers need replacing. The front 2 would always stick onto the wheels and from taking them on and off they were corroding. They're H&R so they're not made of the strongest material since they try to make them as light as possible. As for the transmission code, I used a half ass one and he's going to make sure whats up with it tomorrow along with the CV boot. He's going to replace it, fill it up with grease, and if it leaks again, worst case scenario its the axel.

Update:

The front left axel turned out to be destroyed...I don't see how this is possible.

Last edited by Amini77; 08-22-2014 at 01:27 PM..
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      08-22-2014, 11:19 AM   #2
Jeff@TopGearSolutions
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In the future you should put some anti seize between the spacers and wheels to limit corrosion and make them easier to remove.
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      08-22-2014, 01:38 PM   #3
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Jeff@TopGearSolutions View Post
In the future you should put some anti seize between the spacers and wheels to limit corrosion and make them easier to remove.
We did, I'm probably going to run no spacers.
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      08-22-2014, 03:11 PM   #4
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Amini77 View Post
We did, I'm probably going to run no spacers.
Wow, that's surprising, it usually helps a lot. I can only imagine how bad they would be without anti seize then. By the way, in case the message didn't come across clearly I was referring to putting anti seize on the back of the spacers, not just the studs.
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      08-22-2014, 03:23 PM   #5
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Originally Posted by Jeff@TopGearSolutions View Post
Wow, that's surprising, it usually helps a lot. I can only imagine how bad they would be without anti seize then. By the way, in case the message didn't come across clearly I was referring to putting anti seize on the back of the spacers, not just the studs.
That's exactly what we did but it seems to be a common problem with spacers to corrode where the wheel sits around the spacer's hub. Hopefully it won't look too bad without spacers
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      08-22-2014, 05:52 PM   #6
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      08-22-2014, 06:36 PM   #7
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AXLE
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