Hello, i have WR1043 v3 with flash stick (extroot) and hdd (ntfs, external power source) in one USB hub.
Sometimes when i use samba or minidlna services drives got disconnected and sometimes it's worse.
Yesterday i could not even log in over ssh (some generic error) or web interface (bad gateway?).
I already tried to change USB hub, didn't helped.
Probably your usb-to-hdd adapter has an internal code that put it down to sleep or power saving after a while, or maybe it is just have a malfunction, maybe is the usb hub too that has a malfunction.
you could try to touch file and sync using crontab to check if is a timeout from adapter (happened to me once).
keep in mind that ntfs-3g is really cpu consuming, if you have minidlna or other scripts that scan ntfs it will use a lot of cpu on the WR1043 and that will be a problem. Even worst if you use samba... will be safer and lightweight to use ext4.