Noise from front right wheel (not wheel bearing?)

[Crim]

So a couple weeks ago I was driving around in my 1994 4wd explorer and started seeing billows of smoke pour out from my right front wheel. I decided to stop and tow the car home, assuming it was a bad wheel bearing and I was a further away from home than I wanted to risk driving it.

I got it home, pulled it all apart and all of the bearings and the races looked perfectly fine. I replaced the inner and outer wheel bearings, along with the seals, packed em with grease, greased the slide pins on the calipers, and threw it back together.... and there was a "wheel bearing howl" that starts at around 30mph.

I then took it back home, tore it apart again, and this time replaced the spindle bearing, packed it with grease, new seals, put it all back together. Same thing, same noise at 35-40mph.

I then replaced the rotor with new races, made sure everything else looked good, put it all back together, and still get the exact same noise.

At this point I'm at a loss. I have no idea where the howl could be coming from.... any ideas? My next step was to swap my manual locking hubs from side to side and see if the noise follows it, but the hubs are relatively new, replaced in the last 4-6 months.

Additional details:
Torquing the hub nuts, I do the inner hub nut to 40 ft-lbs, rotate the wheel several times, back it off, and then to ~1ft-lb, put on the locking ring, and then torque the outter lock nut to ~150ft-lbs. This is what I've found online on this forum, as well as in my service manual.

Help! I'm getting sick of tearing that front side all apart! Thanks!
Stephen

[rileyrs]

swapping the hubs seams like a good idea. i had a noise problem from the front end of my 93, and it turned out to be an auto hub problem after swapping sides.
good luck

[Crim]

swapping manual hubs + wheels/tires from side to side had no change :/ Completely at a loss now.

[rileyrs]

how does your alignement look, did a tie rod or something send the tire facing too far out or too far in?

[KobeJ05]

check your front differental fluid.

[rileyrs]

differential shouldn't matter giving that the hubs are actually unlocked, since it wouldnt turn. but if there is a hub malfunction then the diff could be a possibility.

[KobeJ05]

could it be maybe his hubs needs to be cleaned? my hubs wont kick in and someone before me put grease in the hubs instead of atf. maybe thats the problem. but i did have his noise one time around 35 40 mph and i put oil in my diff and it solved it. not sure how it did since the hubs wasnt kicking in.

[Crim]

alignment should be good. I think the brakes may be dragging on that side. For the first 5 mins or so I can brake normally, after that the car starts pulling hard to the left when I brake as tho my right brake is overheated and not grabbing anymore. I'm starting to think that my wheel bearings were fine to start with and perhaps my caliper just seized up?

Is it possible that my spindle is warped? If I throw my new rotor + wheel bearings on and rotate the rotor around, there is some slight run-out.

I guess next up is replacing the caliper?

EDIT -- So far I've replaced outer wheel bearings, inner spindle bearing, new greased slide pins on the caliper, new rotor, and new pads. All without any change :/

[rileyrs]

have someone activate the brake and release, with the car running, while you turn the wheel, to see if its dragging bad or not.
no sense in spending the money on a new caliper until you have made sure thats it.

[Tony H]

You did a good job Packing the bearings with grease?? Not just plop some grease on them, You actually worked it into the bearing very well? Cause it sounds like a dry bearing

[Crim]

It could be (?) I bought one of those bearing packers from autozone, its got two cone shaped pieces of plastic that you sandwich the bearing between. Then you pump grease into it and eventually it pours out of the bearing. I've also put extra globs of grease on the outside of the bearing when installing it, I recall reading somewhere you're supposed to create a dam at the edge of the bearing (?)

This is the bearing packer I have:


What do you think?

[Tony H]

That should be OK. Just trying to get a feel. If you wiped some on the race and some over the top of the bearings... That would worry me.
Swap the Manual Hubs and see if the noise follows the Hubs. I don't think it's the Brakes.. even if they are a secondary issue, I don't think they would "howl".

[94Gexplorer]

is there a noise or resistance when you spin the wheel

[Crim]

Only light dragging of the brake pads. So you hear as the pads lightly scrape the rotor, no other resistance. I think this is fairly normal, its not like the pads are dragging to the point where its difficult to spin the wheel. If you spin it w/o the caliper attached, no resistance/no noise at all.

[Crim]

Do you think the pads just need to bed in more? I've done several hard stops, and the brakes on that side fade super quick, which causes the car to pull hard to the opposite side after 3 good stops. The side in question will also start to smoke, although I haven't been able to confirm its the pads smoking, vs bearing grease. No burning smell, just light/white colored smoke rising up. And of coarse the hub on that side is ridiculously hot.

[Crim]

Originally Posted by Tony H

That should be OK. Just trying to get a feel. If you wiped some on the race and some over the top of the bearings... That would worry me.
Swap the Manual Hubs and see if the noise follows the Hubs. I don't think it's the Brakes.. even if they are a secondary issue, I don't think they would "howl".

I've swapped over the hubs, no difference in noise (Didn't follow the hubs to the opposite side of the car)

[Crim]

Well new caliper + brake line made no difference, that was more or less expected. Didn't mind replacing that so much because the piston in the old caliper was cracked in a few places.

I bought a 3rd wheel bearing and swapped the bearings around to try to isolate each bearing and make sure I didn't have a bad one somehow, made no difference at all.

Checked the front diff fluid level just for kicks, its topped off.

So whats possibly left? Perhaps its just road/tire noise? Should I get an alignment? I've swapped my front wheels/tires from side to side, which made no difference.

[92exp4x4]

I was conviced it was a caliper until i read the last post, hmmm.. The rotor has not blued from heat? Check both sides of it. Try driving the truck without the hubs installed at all and see what happens.

The only other thing I can think of is you are having a problem with the anti-lock brake system?? If its a 94, its got four wheel ABS. Thats a long shot though.

You did replace the rubber brake line, correct?

[Crim]

Rotor is brand new, looks clean/not blue. I think the brakes are no longer dragging, no more smoke coming off of them after a short drive. I did replace the rubber line that goes to the caliper.

The ABS is disabled, I pulled the fuse. I destroyed the ABS wheel sensor when I removed the spindle, and by a stroke of bad luck, the sensor I pulled out of the junkyard also appears to be bad because it trips the ABS light after I roll about 50 feet. I just yanked the fuse to try to take that out of the equation.

Maybe I'm not torquing the inner hub nut enough? I'm basically just getting it tight by hand w/ the socket over it. Then the locking ring, and then torquing the outer nut to ~150ft-lbs by my torque wrench.

At this point I'm really at a loss of what it could be. Its definitely wheel speed dependent (pull the clutch at 35mph and the noise stays the same relative to road speed). It sounds like a wheel bearing, but I've swapped 3 around and the noise never changes at all. All the bearings are packed and look great (same w/ the races in the rotor). The noise comes on strongly at 30mph, then increases in pitch to where you can barely hear it until right at 60mph it comes back loudly again.

EDIT -- also engaging 4wd w/ and w/o locking the manual hubs makes no difference.

[92exp4x4]

I have always used feel for wheel bearings. Make sure you are rotating the rotor while seating the bearing. I tighten the inner until the rotor drags, and keep tightening until it takes a lot of effort to turn the rotor. I then loosen the nut until the rotor turns with a slight drag. Install the lock ring and tighten the outer nut about the same as a lug nug. I put my body weight onto a breaker bar until it won't turn any more with a slight bounce. My whopping 140lb self!

The bearing may not be getting tight enough if you are not turning the rotor while tightening the inner nut. Make sure the bearings are still good after they have been run like this. Also, you may have gotten a defective new one? Are you absolutely, positive that its coming from this wheel?