Wheel bearings....

 

I was thinking wheel bearings as well. Luckily that's cheap if you do the work yourself. Wheel bearings make weird noises when they go bad.

 

No, definitely not wheel bearings.

Both front wheel bearings are new, less than 3000 miles on them, and this is not any kind of a howling sound.
I've dealt with so many bad wheel bearings I know that sound in my sleep.
The thump, creates a very light snapping feel, in the bottom front of the car, that's why I'm thinking CV joint.

For the record, each wheel bearing up front costs $300 to have replaced at the garage, and the back wheel bearings/hub assembly cost $384 for the rear passenger side, and $404 for the rear driver's side, so no, wheel bearings are NOT a cheap repair.

I've done all 4 in about 1 calendar year, and if I have to do them again I'll be sending the car to the junkyard.
The rusted-out 16 year old Corolla isn't worth putting another $1000 into it.
So, ruling out wheel bearings, anyone have experience with a front end thumping sound/feel?

 

No, definitely not wheel bearings.

Both front wheel bearings are new, less than 3000 miles on them, and this is not any kind of a howling sound.
I've dealt with so many bad wheel bearings I know that sound in my sleep.
The thump, creates a very light snapping feel, in the bottom front of the car, that's why I'm thinking CV joint.

For the record, each wheel bearing up front costs $300 to have replaced at the garage, and the back wheel bearings/hub assembly cost $384 for the rear passenger side, and $404 for the rear driver's side, so no, wheel bearings are NOT a cheap repair.

I've done all 4 in about 1 calendar year, and if I have to do them again I'll be sending the car to the junkyard.
The rusted-out 16 year old Corolla isn't worth putting another $1000 into it.
So, ruling out wheel bearings, anyone have experience with a front end thumping sound/feel?

Yes, they ARE a cheap repair, if you do it yourself. It cost me like $120 in parts to replace both my rear wheel bearings with new hubs and abs speed sensors. Fronts are a bit trickier though, but not $600 for both tricky. Do your own work and save some money.

As for what the issue is, if you're having a mechanic do the work anyways, why don't you just ask him? We can't diagnose your car online by just "it's making a sound." You need to jack the car up and inspect the suspension and try and find out if there is any play by jamming the wheel back and forth and up and down. Then you need to inspect any rubber joints, bushings, etc. and check for irregular tire wear. You cannot diagnose by just saying the car makes a machine gun noise... I've heard wheel bearings that sound like a fucking m60 going off and it gets louder and faster as you speed up. They don't always sound the same.

 

Here's what you should do to test.

Get the car on jack stands. Then move each wheel to see if you are able to replicate the sound.

Lower ball joint, control arm bushings, or tie rod ends since you describe it as the noise can be heard when changing directions. Check your struts also with a bounce test.

Are any of the tires cupping? Someone told me recently that if the tire is cupped, it would mimic the sound of wheel bearings.

 

It's winter time in North America, and Canada, specifically.
There won't be any "do it yourself" repairs until summer and bearing replacement which is definitely not the problem, requires a hydraulic press, hardly the type of repair a layman can do in his own driveway.

I posted here because believe it or not, problems can and have been diagnosed by people who also had the same symptoms, so rather than just guessing, if you haven't had this type of an experience, just abstain from answering.

 

It's winter time in North America, and Canada, specifically.
There won't be any "do it yourself" repairs until summer and bearing replacement which is definitely not the problem, requires a hydraulic press, hardly the type of repair a layman can do in his own driveway.

I posted here because believe it or not, problems can and have been diagnosed by people who also had the same symptoms, so rather than just guessing, if you haven't had this type of an experience, just abstain from answering.

Again, you're not going to be able to diagnose it solely based on that. We can only guess. You need to jack up the car and examine the suspension like we've been telling you. And many of us here are not pros and have replaced wheel bearings. They don't require a press, there are tools for replacing bearings and for the rear they sell full bearing and hub assembly that just bolt on.

 

The symptoms again:
-Rhythmic thumping sound, (i.e. 3 seconds with 1 thump per second, than another three seconds with No thumps at all. Rinse and repeat.)

The thumps are affected by speed, NOT affected by steering or breaking.(rules out warped rotor)

-Can be felt through the floor of the car (up front) but NOT through the steering wheel.

Not bearings because:
All 4 bearings are brand new
-the sound is a thump, not a grinding, howling drone.
-the sound is intermittent, not constant.

 

Op, I know the weather isn't the greatest where you are. The entire goal is to get your suspension in the air to try and isolate where the issue is.

Suspension noise is one of the most difficult since there's many places noise can come from.

Just the control arms alone has many points of contact with the spindle, tie rods, lower ball joint, stabilizer bar, and axles.

With the suspension suspended in the air, it takes the load off the suspension. Only in certain areas are to be loaded like the ball joint.

 

Ok, I took the front driver's-side tire off so I could get a look.The strut's boot is ripped.
I've attached a couple of pics.
I checked the CV joints and saw no other damaged rubber boots.

What I don't understand is why a bad strut due to a torn rubber boot, would make a thumping sound that is directly linked to the speed of the drive tire/wheel.
I would have expected random bumps in the road to cause the strut to make a thumping sound, not an increase or decrease in the rpm's of the tire/wheel.

How critical is it to get this fixed? Can it wait until after X-mas or is this one of those "shouldn't drive the car before getting this fixed" critical items?

 

That strut is completely wasted. The boot is just a dust cover, the fluid is gone and the shaft could actually be moving sideways in the housing. Possible impact damage could also have damaged the wheel making it cause the noise you hear? I would not wait but then I have a complete replacement strut sitting in my garage and another under the porch.

Get loaded strut assemblies to save the work involved in swapping out the spring for another strut. The way you get the upper mount, and bearing, all the parts that could be worn out besides the actual shock absorber portion. Replace in pairs. Cuts labor by about 75%.

 

Yeah, I've got a couple different models of Monroe strut assembly saved to my Amazon wishlist.

I'm trying to get a newer Corolla within the next 12 months so I want to spend the least amount possible keeping this car on the road until then.

Not sure I understand why replacing both front struts would be cheaper in labour costs.
For now, I'm only fixing the bad one.

 

struts are usually done in pairs. That said, that rubber piece is just that, a rubber cover for your struts. They could be bad but I don't think you can 100% say your issue is from that just by visually seeing a torn strut boot... Does the car make a lot of noise going over bumps or otherwise rough roads? I thought your said your thumping noise was getting faster and faster as you sped up? I don't think this makes sense for struts to be causing that noise. Your struts may be bad too but doesn't really make sense to me for that to be the cause of your noise... If your struts are bad they'd be bottoming out a lot I think, and your ride would be a lot sloppier.

 

Hell, go to pick and pull on sale day and get a used one. The time it takes to replace the assembly is much lower than replacing the shock absorber part alone. 3 bolts up top, two on the bottom cut the brake hose. My used parts cost me nothing, bought a whole car sold parts until my cost was 0, can't get any cheaper than that, hehe.

 

Good point. I don't get any noises from going iver a bumpy road, I do get a rhythmic thump that speeds up and slows down as the car's driving speed increases and decreases.
It definitely feels like something banging into something.

 

Have you jacked up your car yet?

 

Just enough to take the tire off. I have 1 jack and no jack stands, so I took the tire and wheel off the side I thought the thumping is coming from and saw that strut's torn boot.
The CV joint's boot was fine.

 

Just enough to take the tire off. I have 1 jack and no jack stands, so I took the tire and wheel off the side I thought the thumping is coming from and saw that strut's torn boot.
The CV joint's boot was fine.

Follow this guide and examine the entire front suspension. Also check the driveline

 

You have a jack in the car, unless that is the one you are using, and something under the front of the rocker panel to give you a backup in case something gives out.

 

The way I tested struts was to put a load in each corner strut. As the vehicle bounced, eventually it's going to make noise at the bad corner.

Looks are definitely deceiving. A torn boot on the strut is to do 2 things. A)keep dirt out, B)keep the grease inside.

Try grabbing the strut body and see if it moves. Also check your driver side strut tower to see if the bolts are loose.

 

Jack it up and take another look with the wheel ON. Spin the wheel and see if anything is slapping against it.

 

Seperated tire or something in the tread of the tire could potentially make rhythmic noise.

 

Came back to update. It was the front passenger-side bearing. This worries me because I just had that replaced with the bearing-hub assembly less than 1 year previously, and it didn't have 3000 miles on it. Now I've just had the bearing and hub replaced again, $580, price has gone up, and I'm worried that it won't last a year before it goes again.

 

I see. To me, front bearings is a tricky part as there are not many good bearings for cheap. If you are having this issue you may want to check the junk yard for the complete knuckle with wheel bearing assembly and replace it that way. If your in a colder climate, the chances of good salvageable knuckle assembly is debatable. It kind of sounds more like a control arm ball joint issue to me. Probably check that as well.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

A problem that happens with the front bearings is if the mechanic installed them into the hub/knuckle using an impact wrench. This causes problems down the road. The idea is that the impact wrench puts great and repeated impact pressure on the bearings and they shake so hard that they become compromised and then later fail prematurely. They are supposed to be slowly pressed in. I just replaced a front bearing on a Honda and pressed it in slowly by hand with a wrench (and a bearing cup/spacer installation kit that I rented from the parts store). No impact. I knew this prior to doing it, which is why I didn't use my impact on it. Also, the bearing must be torqued at the correct rating prior to driving the car. The bearing I replaced was also new, but the person who installed it didn't torque it properly (and I don't know if he used an impact or not, but I also noticed that he cut up the hub when removing the race. I took my time and cut the race off without cutting the hub.

This is why I like to do my own work. Mechanics are under a lot of pressure to hurry hurry hurry, so they will cut corners in order to finish quickly. It works fine when you drive the car out of his shop, but the damage has already been done and it shows its head a year or two later.

I still have my original front bearings at about 395K miles now. The rear bearings went bad about a year or two ago (maybe around 372K miles). I do not live in a place that snows or puts salt on the roads, so that might be part of the reason for the longevity.

Do you know what brand of bearing your mechanic used? There are some awful cheap ones out there. I used Timken, which is good. There's another one that actually supplies the OE, but I don't remember the brand name and it is a similar name to a cheap brand, so I get them confused. I think either Old Mechanic or Greasymechtech knows the brand, so you could ask them.

 

I didn't just have the bearing replaced, I had the hub assembly done. Twice in about 13 months.
I've saved a couple of fully loaded Knuckles (bearing, Knuckle,backing plate & Hub) in my Amazon wish list in case I have to replace the bearing again in another 12 months
'm hoping with a fully assembled knuckle that already has the bearing pressed in (eliminating the chance of an improper installation), that if I have to buy it 1 year from now, that it will be the last time.

 

I have a faint thumping sound in my front-end while driving. It is a steady rhythmic sound that speeds up and slows down as the car speeds up and slows down.
I thought that maybe it is the beginning of a CV joint wearing out, but there is NO clicking sound when I turn the steering wheel in either direction, and I can not feel the thumps through the steering wheel. The steering is smooth with no vibrations or jolts.I can just barely feel the thumps through the floor of the car, but not at all through the steering wheel.
The only other clue I have is that thumps become softer when I turn left, and more prominent when I turn right while driving. (The difference is minor though)
Also: my breaking is smooth. No issues hard-braking or regular breaking, i.e. no pulling, shaking, etc. while breaking.

The thumping sound starts to sound like a machine gun or helicopter blades while driving at highway speeds, (but not very loud). The radio on at low volume covers the sound easily so I'm thinking that whatever is wrong is just beginning to "go".

Any ideas what the most probable culprit could be?
I'm trying figure out how much it would cost to repair and budget for that (This close to X-mas is a terrible time to have yet another car repair to pay for) without having to pay a garage/mechanic $150 to diagnose the issue. (I'd rather spend that $150 on the repair itself.

Sooo... bringing this one out of the archives lol....

I have a very similar issue going on with my Tacoma... This problem started after I hit a deer so let me start there. I just had the bearing assemblies replaced due to a separate issue that is unrelated. So its definitely NOT the bearings. Struts are fairly new TRD Baja upgrades. The dealership also seemed reluctant to look into the issue, wanting to go item by item starting with the bearings which I wanted to replace anyway because they were aftermarket and gave me the warning lights (you know that one issue that happens when the signal ring dont work) and then insisting that the issue was gone even though they never confirmed they understood what I was after. Now, after they did all the work (bearings, tie rods, alignment, ps fuid, brake fluid, tire rotate) the thumping is waay fainter but I can still feel it on a smooth road, any small bumps drown it out. I'm of the thought that it has to do with the axle because of all the reasons OP mentioned AND that is the side I hit the deer on (small deer maybe 90 lb, jumped into low corner at 60mph) I just dont want to go down the path of replacing item by item and not fixing the problem.

 

I have an '06 Toyota Matrix that has the same rhythmic knocking sound (increases an decreases speed with car speed) and I just had both axles replaced and it didn't change the sound at all. Have either of you been successful in finding and eliminating the sound?

 

Check engine and trans mounts.

Do you hear the knocking when changing directions or a sudden bump in throttle? If this is the case, mounts need to be inspected and replaced.