[jderrick]

Hey,

So my 1999 2.2 automatic Camry is making some noise starting around 40 mph. Not the engine or transmission I believe (car at speed in neutral revving the engine doesn't affect sound). Sounds like if I put big offroad truck tires on my rear axle with lots of road noise (or like I'm being followed at a hundred yards by a B-17 from WWII). Car's handling the same, and I have pulled a couple pebbles out of the treads.

Any suggestions?

JD

 

[LynchburgCSI]

Is it a whirring sound? My first thought is bad wheel bearings.

 

[t-bone59]

Assuming the tires are not cupped and have been rotated to give the best wear pattern, then yea I agree as a bearing would be my best guess. If you can jack the car up and spin the wheel, you might hear a slight noise or feel a little roughness when spinning it. I've done this with the wheel off and spin the bearing by hand. A real bad one can be felt. Once the weight of the car is set on a bad bearing, it is impossible to avoid.

 

[Perkins]

Sounds like if I put big offroad truck tires on my rear axle with lots of road noise (or like I'm being followed at a hundred yards by a B-17 from WWII).

hahaha this made me laugh. I would agree with Lynch and say that it sounds almost like your wheel bearing is going bad. One test that you could do is to lift the back tire off the ground and grab a hold of it at 9 o'clock and 3 o'clock and try to wiggle the tire around. pull towards you, then push it. Then move your hands to 6 and 12 o'clock and move the tire pull it towards you push it.
The amount of wiggle room that your wheel has is play. There should be very little or no play in the wheel. If you do have play in your wheel, you need to replace your wheel bearings or hub or check to make sure that it is fully tight to the hub assembly. If there is no play in your wheel, that doesn't necessarily mean your wheel bearing is good. When you rotate the wheel by hand, and experience roughness or noise, this too can indicate bad wheel bearings.

Another check you can make is by checking the temperature of the wheel hub after driving ten miles. The hub portion should be barely warm (the wheel it self will be hotter because of the brakes). The hub's job is to prevent friction with the body. If the hub is warm, friction is causing it to heat up, and you need new hubs.

 

[jderrick]

Thanks for the info! Well, the tires (which are in good shape), wheels, brake drums weren't warm after driving a ways this morning. I looked in my Hanes manual and it looked like replacing a hub/bearing assembly was doable at my skill level (I succeeded at a radiator swap, almost managed a timing belt ) but anyone got any thoughts?

 

[LynchburgCSI]

As far as replacing wheel bearings... I JUST added those DIYs to the sticky.

Be sure to CHECK everything as posted above before you start buying parts!