need diagnosis help (again)

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H

heent

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, VA
Wife's 2004 Freestar is squealing from the passenger front wheel area. I thought it only made the noise once the wheel had warmed up. I found tonight that if I spin the wheel slowly by hand cold, it makes the high-pitched squeal only in the forward direction...spin a little faster and the pitch of the squeal actually gets lower for some reason...spin a little faster and it disappears. Now I know it really shrieks if you let it warm up on the interstate for a couple minutes...must be loud because you can hear it clearly at 70mph. I didn't find any bearing play grabbing the top/bottom of the wheel and moving it in and out. I pulled the rim, pulled the caliper, and pulled the pads away from the rotor and it still made the noise, so I know it's not brakes. Definitely coming from the wheel area and not the center differential. When driving warmed up and squealing, it goes away if you steer left, comes on if you steer right or leave it straight ahead.



What do you think?...wheel bearing (which is a bearing hub on this van - whole thing is replaced not just bearings and/or races) or CV at the end of the half-shaft? I leaning toward bearings at this point, even with no play...don't think the constant velocity joint would make this, especially only in one direction, but what do I know?



thanks for any opinions
 
Bearings. They will make noise when getting bad and by the time you have "play", they are shot.;)



I say this since you were smart enough to eliminate the other culprits.;)
 
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I don't believe that I have ever heard a front hub bearing emit a high pitched squeal. I would imagine for the bearing to get to this point it had to have been going bad for a while and you should have heard some rumbling. Is there any rumbling that you can hear from that side while driving? What's weird is how you describe the situation that you can make it happen. When you steer left it loads the right side and therefore puts more pressure on the bearing, normally this is when noises in bearings get louder, not go away. Make sure you don't have a backing plate touching the rotor somewhere. Another area of concern is the dust shield/seal between the back of the hub bearing and the face of the cv joint. These can and will get dirty and or dry out and cause the same squeal noise that you are talking about.
 
Heent,



We had a 2004 Freestar with the same problem. I checked the brakes, (first thought) but the brakes were replaced when we purchased the van in 2005. I then noticed it was doing it mostly around corners without applying the brakes... while coasting around the corner. I checked again on same corner, with van in neutral... same high pitch squeel.



I took it to the dealer and sure enough they said the drivers side was at fault. They replaced it under warranty, no more squeel. There was no rumble, and the wheel turned freely, but just made the high pitched squeel.



Dave
 
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l1tech...I'm nearly positive I have my steering directions correct in that the noise disappears turning left and appears running straight and turning right, mind you this is when making minor corrections on the interstate at cruising speed. A friend had mentioned, as you did, that this would typically be incorrect for a right front wheel bearing as it is loaded turning left and should produce the noise and unloaded turning right which should diminish it, the opposite of what I believe I've found. There's definitely no contact between the rotor and the dust shield...might have a closer look at the seal though - thanks.
 
Dave...sorry, I wasn't sure from your message, so are you saying the dealer did find that it was the wheel bearing that was at fault or did it actually turn out to be the brakes?



thanks
 

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