XRAY - Model racing cars

What might cause a layshaft bearing to fail? A few months ago I had one seize up (the one nearer the spur gear). This evening I found that the same bearing had completely disintegrated. This certainly explained a couple of bad recent results!

Could this be coincidence, or is it likely that something else is damaged and causing this bearing to fail?

(Side note: I was very pleased with being able to change the bearing in under 15 minutes - credit to the Xray design team!)[/i]

I've had the same thing happen, until I realized that there wasn't enough endplay in the assembled shaft/bearing assembly. Since I'm using a solid aluminum layshaft, the spacer used in between the pulleys and the bearings supporting the layshaft was also made of aluminum. To resolve the problem, I removed about .5mm from the layshaft spacer to allow for a tiny bit of endplay @ either end of the shaft. this way the bearings aren't under a side load, which tends to shorten the life of the bearings.

The same bearing failed on my Factory Xray last weekend. Here's the aftermath...



I'll be lubing the bearing from now on....

That's what my bearings looked like until I made the small mod on my layshaft spacer. Lubrication of those small bearings is KEY for getting a decent service life from the bearing.