Bearing broke when turned into 4 Low

Hi guys,

Can someone please help? I have got my first Tacoma 4x4 access cab this month and I was checking out the 4H mode and 4L mode. When turned into 4L, it made that beeping noice from the dash which means the 4L is not engaged. Then I tried moving the truck forward and heard a grinding noise and the truck shook like I hit something. Just turned back into 2H. When I took it to he mechanic, realized that the front right wheel bearing broke and that was really bad. I changed the bearing and ABS Sensor.

I was wondering why it happened and now I am Paranoid it might happen again, so I don't wanna turn it back to 4L again. Can someone please help me understand what might be wrong?

Thanks in advance guys

 

should only engage 4L when stopped and the tranny in neutral. When making the switch sometimes it helps to turn the steering wheel a bit back and forth to help get it engaged.
just curious... were you on pavement and turning when this happened?

 

4X4 should NEVER be engaged if you're on hard dry road surfaces with good traction. It is intended to be used where traction is poor. Technically you should be OK if driven in a straight line, but if you're turning the entire drivetrain gets in a bind if you're in 4X4.

When cornering the outside wheels need to turn much faster than the inside wheels since they have a lot farther go travel to get to the same place. In 2wd this is easy. In 4X4 the drivetrain tries to force all 4 wheels to turn at the same speed. If you're on gravel, loose dirt, grass, mud, snow etc. the inside wheels will spin slightly on the ground since they are now turning at the same speed but traveling far less distance. If traction is too good for them to spin everything in the driveline is in a bind.

You rarely see a catastrophic failure and can often get away with no apparent damage. But it does cause premature parts breakage. In rare cases you'll break parts on the 1st try, but it's more likely that the truck has been used in 4X4 in the past where it shouldn't have, and it finally failed.

Your trucks gearing is reduced by a factor of about 2.7X when in low range. That's putting a lot more torque on stuff than you'd get in high range. If you use 4X4 when, and where it's supposed to be used you almost never have issues.

 

Thanks for the information guys.

So, yes, I was on pavement when this happened. Also mine is a 5 speed manual transmission. I remember saw a video where the guy in that video said, you should be in gear when changing from 2h to 4h and 4l. I guess that was wrong, also I didn't depress the clutch when I turned it to 4L mode. Do you think that is why it happened?

So the transmission should be in neutral, clutch depressed and the vehicle should be on top of something with less traction, in order to use the 4L mode.

I was worried if the 4L gears might get seized or something if I don't use it once in a while, also I was kind of curious to see how it works.

 

The wheel bearing broke?
Or the CV axle broke?

 

It was the passenger side wheel bearing.
I was able to hear a grinding noice while turning to the left. And I saw it when the mechanic opened it up. That was completely destroyed. The mechanic said, "Lucky you made it till here".