The best/worst bodge I've done was when I lost the balls out of both bearing on the right hand wheel of my Carry Freedom trailer while on tour this summer.
I had done around 3,500 miles with it loose after I crashed on the Serbian side of the Iron Gates gorge before it finally gave up the ghost on the German-Netherlands boarder.
I was hoping it would get me home.
When I finally took the bolt off which holds the wheel on I could see that the inner bearing has no balls left in it at all and the outer bearing had only about half the balls left which just fell out without the nut to hold them in place ......
I couldn't get the old races out of the wheel because with only the outer races left in the wheel there was no ledge to get anything against to knock them out.
Luckily I was only 60 miles from Quakenbruk in Germany where the main dealer is.
How to get there after sending them an e-mail.
Bus or Cycle ??
Cycle ...
So I bodged both bearings to get there.
The inner bearing came out of the center of my handlebars as they are held in place on two sealed bearings of the right size, so I used one out of there.
That went on the axle and the wheel was placed on it the wrong was around so the bearing fitted inside the nut recess in the hub.
Then a mix of spacers went in, both from the old wheel and handles bars.
This let me make the outer bearing out of a plain M12 washer .....
This was fixed by the spacers so it was in the middle of the old outer race.
This not only gave something for the wheel to run on but also stopped the wheel from just sliding off the axle.
The wheel was still a bit loose on the axle but it turned.
It took my a day and a half but that bodge got my to Quakenbruk under my own power, where I got two new wheels.